


The Great Are Often Bruised

by onyxmoon



Series: as good place to fall as any [1]
Category: Shadowhunters (TV)
Genre: Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Emotional Sex, Hurt/Comfort, Insecurity, Insomnia, M/M, Prophetic Dreams, Protective Alec Lightwood, Protective Magnus Bane, Suspense, Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms, Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-10
Updated: 2018-06-10
Packaged: 2019-05-20 13:40:39
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 40,603
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14895641
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/onyxmoon/pseuds/onyxmoon
Summary: He had feared for Magnus’ life before, yet he had still been clutching to this fragile, desperate belief that he was untouchable.





	The Great Are Often Bruised

_There are some thoughts I simply cannot endure._

\- Albert Camus, The Plague

 

**i.**

Alec wakes up with a rush, cold sweat covering his skin and pooling in the hollow of his throat.

A nameless, faceless fear grips his chest with a force that, at the moment, feels like it could truly shatter him. Like it could crack its way to his core and violently carve out the very few things he couldn’t live without.

He feels cold, freezing almost. Yet the sheets are too hot and too heavy, oppressing where they’re tangled around his thighs and ankles. _Air_ , he thinks as he kicks his legs to push them further. He needs air. A space to breathe, to think.

A flash of dark blue flickers behind his eyelids, so vivid that for a second he’s sure that it was Magnus’–

_Magnus._

Alec fumbles blindly for him, hands shaking in his desperation to banish this grave trepidation he can find no reason for.

It’s too dark for him to see properly, but he knows that he’s close.

A quiet, throaty noise escapes from Magnus as Alec finally reaches his elbow and pulls him, perhaps a little roughly, against his own chest. The silk sheets rumple uncomfortably between them but Alec can’t bring himself to pull away long enough to get them out of the way. For some weird reason he feels that it would be a critical mistake, to let go of Magnus now.

He can’t find any logical reason for this sudden agitation, yet it feels just as real as Magnus’ elevated breathing against his jaw.

“Alexander?” Magnus’ voice is bleary, soft in a way that’s immediately helping to loosen the vigorous squeeze around Alec’s ribcage.

He exhales shakily and presses his palm more firmly against the curve of Magnus’ lower back, spreading his fingers wide against the warm skin. It shouldn’t surprise him, to have nightmares at times like this. The world had always been cold, although maybe not this chaotic. _And yet_ , yet Alec can’t recall having a nightmare this vivid ever before, can’t remember when was the last time he woke up with a gasp stuck in his throat.

“Alexander,” Magnus presses, quiet but determined. He is trying to move back enough to see Alec’s face, “Hey, talk to me. What’s wrong?”

Alec swallows and opens his mouth but the words are thick, getting stuck in his throat and dry tongue.

A sudden warm light fills the room and Magnus is moving further away. Alec makes a rough noise in his throat and digs his fingers harder against Magnus’ back and hips, chest constricting again with a newly ignited panic.

“No, stay, stay–” he finds himself mumbling fervently, “– _stay_ …”

Magnus’ half-hearted attempt to pull away ceases immediately.

“Okay, okay, I won’t, just–” the sheets disappear, allowing Alec to pull Magnus even closer. He does so, overly grateful for such a small thing.

“Could you turn off the lights,” he rasps out, somehow missing the protective veil of darkness around them. The light was too exposing, making the sharp-edged dread in his gut more prominent rather than chasing it away. “Please.”

He can feel worry emanating from Magnus in silent waves. The lowly whispered “sure” comes only after a few prolonged seconds and then the darkness is embracing them again.

Magnus sneaks his hands around Alec’s back, too, dry fingers skimming across the sweaty, rune-scarred skin. The touch is comforting, so Alec focuses on it: breathes through the viscous layer of fear in his throat, haplessly ignores the wild pounding of his heart.

“Alec?” There’s a cautious plead in Magnus’ soft voice. “Are you–”

“Bad dream,” Alec says, words coming out with a rush. “Just a really, really bad dream.”

Magnus makes a sympathetic noise in the back of his throat and inches even closer, warm breath tickling against Alec’s cheek.

“I’m sorry.”

Alec makes a vague noise in return and nuzzles against the hollow spot under Magnus’ ear, trying to force his thoughts elsewhere. The cold color of blue stays in the edge of his thoughts longer than he would like; an ominous, silent threat lingering in the shadows of his mind.

He is almost desperate enough to ask for sex.

He wants to confine Magnus between himself and the rumpled sheets, wants to bury himself in that warm body until Magnus can’t hold those uneven, hoarse gasps in his lungs anymore. Until Magnus is all he sees, all he hears, all he feels.

Until the world has narrowed down to Magnus’ heavy-lidded, unglamoured eyes only.

He wants to – the need burns like fire – but it doesn’t feel right now. Not like this.

The heat of Magnus’ skin and the rhythmic beat of his heart are enough for now. A slower way to recover, perhaps, but at least it’s not a mere distraction.

Alec keeps taking deep, steady breaths in, feeling fractionally better after every exhale. Magnus’ shampoo smells luscious, intoxicating but not too overwhelming as Alec presses his nose into the soft, gel-free hair.

“Do you want to talk about it?” Magnus asks after a moment.

Alec doesn’t.

Not because he wants to withhold this from Magnus, but merely because there isn’t much to talk about. Except of how it feels. Something that, right now, above all else, he wants to forget. The fear is still too raw, sitting heavily in his chest.

“Can’t really remember it,” Alec still answers, truthfully. “Just the feel of it.”

He feels Magnus nod. Then;

“You’re okay. Nothing can get to you here.”

Alec halts in his thoughts, momentarily confused by Magnus’ words.

Because the fear was never _for himself_.

Of course it was logical for Magnus to assume so, but the dread twisting in his gut wasn’t the kind that made him want to shy away. No. It was more desperation-laced. An awful feeling of being too slow, too indecisive, too oblivious to notice that something was slipping away from his reach. Something invaluable.

He doesn’t bother correcting Magnus, just makes an affirming noise in his throat.

 _Just a dream_ , he convinces himself as his heart starts to finally settle.

Just a bad dream at the bad times. Nothing more.

The sleep doesn’t come easily, but it comes, even if only a few hours before the sunrise. And in the warm morning light, with Magnus breathing steadily against his clavicle, the haunting thoughts of the night feel distant. Unimportant. So he forgets.

The memory fades, yes, and so does the fear, but something stays.

Something that later feels a lot like prognostication.

 

* * *

 

**ii.**

It’s all falling apart.

That’s the only thought that occupies Alec’s mind as he buries his face in his hands. He is trying hard not to ignore the half-filled report on his desk. The one he left there yesterday with a promise to finish it first thing in the morning.

Procrastination has never been in the list of Alec’s bad habits, but yesterday he had been desperate to forget the content of what he would have to fill the blank pages with.

The image is still clear behind his eyes. At least he doesn’t smell the overwhelming tang of blood anymore, as he had successfully drowned it under the comforting scent of Magnus’ skin last night.

But forgetting didn’t erase the problem.

It’s all falling apart and Alec doesn’t know how to keep the deck even remotely together anymore.

Azazel is still roaming the streets of New York, hitting deeper and deeper into Alec’s nerve every time he’s forced to clean up another little massacre, always a little too late, a little too inadequate.

Izzy is faithfully reminding him that it isn’t his fault, and Alec knows that, logically. It’s just that every time he walks along the neat line of body bags, floor slippery with blood, he can’t help but thinking _if only_.

If only he had been smarter.

If only he had been quicker.

If only he had been more observant.

But there’s no pattern in the trail of dead the demon leaves in its wake. As if it was purely for his amusement, _a pass of time_.

Alec has his hands full with cleaning and covering all the carnages that seem to happen more and more frequently as the days go by. To stop this bloodstained cycle, he knows that his main priority should be locating and banishing Azazel.

And it is, _of course it is_ , but part of his guilt is because he feels that he could do better. His thoughts are almost always only partially in the subject, and no matter how hard he tries, he just can’t seem to focus.

His mind keeps straying to Magnus.

Mostly because Alec knows that he isn’t okay. Hasn’t been after the whole body-swapping ordeal with Valentine, and well, Alec can hardly blame him.

It might be his deeply carved instinct to protect that is running high again, but he doesn’t like leaving Magnus alone. He seems to spend way too much time inside his own head these days.

Izzy is also in the radar of his worry, but most of it stays at bay because, at this work rate they’re pulling, she is in his line of vision more often than not. And Max isn't even allowed to leave the Institute as long as the alert is on. It’s an order that Alec gave purely to keep even some scraps of his piece of mind.

And as if there wasn’t enough on his plate already, Alec has managed to find out that the Soul Sword isn’t in possession of the Clave. They tell him that it’s under control, but Alec highly suspects that they don’t have even a vague idea of its location, let alone any lead of where to start looking.

 _Don’t worry about it_ , they say when he asks about it. _We will handle this._

So yes, it’s all crumbling down, shattering rapidly like the rest of the respect Alec still has for the Clave.

The chair he sits on feels stained. Bad decisions, one after another; that is all this room has witnessed. He still remembers being small and watching the big desk with awe, imagining that some day it would be him sitting behind it.

And finally, here he is.

It doesn’t seem so glamorous anymore.

Ironically enough, where he would rather be at the moment is the bed of a certain warlock; a place his younger self would probably cringe at.

Well, his younger self was quite stupid anyway. A naïve kid, endlessly afraid of critics and maybe therefore sensitive enough to believe every ill-spoken word he heard. A boy who had so desperately wanted to be like his father. Back then he had been obeying mindlessly, hissing warnings at his sister when she first time questioned the logic behind some of the rules of the Clave.

His values and world-views might have changed quite tragically, but some things are still the same. He truly wanted to be a good leader when he was a child and he truly wants to be one now.

The reasons might have changed but that hasn’t.

But the Clave, as he has gradually come to realize, doesn’t care. All they expect from him is to stay in line and keep their dirty little secrets for them.

Alec feels cornered. He wants to do the right thing, to change the old and poisoned ways, but he doesn’t know how to do that without being pushed aside immediately. He finally has some scraps of control and he doesn’t want to lose it now.

He is disappointed, he admits that. He had honestly thought that as a Head of the Institute he would have some influence on the matters. Sadly, the control he holds is only a hollow title in the bigger scale.

And the kind of absolute, unyielding control that the Clave holds has no balance in it at all. Words rarely meant more than actions, and downworlders had definitely seen the weight of the promises that had been given to them in the past.

Trust is a hard thing to fix.

Maybe the Clave doesn’t even see the problem?

Or maybe they simply don’t bother to. It’s easy to look elsewhere.

It has become increasingly annoying. The same old people sitting on the top of the pyramid with their selfish motives, hiding behind their misplaced trust and old ways. And it’s not harmless. People have gotten quietly punished for unproven crimes, merely because of owning a certain heritage. The Clave is strongly denying it, but it’s not exactly a secret.

By now Alec is truly fed up with them trying to justify their corrupted decisions with angelic blood.

He isn’t even sure that it’s only their human side that’s to blame for all these mistakes. Blood means very little to him anymore.

A gentle knock on his door draws Alec back to the present.

He finds himself wishing it to be Magnus, quickly hiding the displeasure from his face when he sees who steps inside.

If someone were to ask Alec the reason why he was so strongly against the guy, Alec wouldn’t have an answer to give. It’s conscious but not logical disliking.

Sebastian Verlac.

Kind smile and even kinder voice. Always helping. Always there when they needed him. A perfect ally and a great addition to their lines. Yet it wasn’t the near perfection that brought Alec to the edge.

There was something in his demeanor. As if hidden behind those warm eyes and easy smiles there was something entirely else underneath.

Something rotten. Unnatural, even.

“Hey.”

Alec straightens his back as the blonde man steps inside, one hand lingering on the wooden edge of the door.

“I hope I’m not disrupting anything?”

Alec considers about saying _yes_. _Actually, you are_.

“Nothing too urgent,” he says instead and taps his pen against the desk. “Something on your mind?”

“Well, yes…” Sebastian closes the door and leans against it. “I’m not completely sure if this is just my own imagination, so I’d like to apologize beforehand if I’m making us both uncomfortable.” His lips are curling into a gentle smile, both expression and voice indicating an awkward feeling behind the words.

For Alec, it looks a little too much like carefully practiced words.

Izzy would probably scold him for his suspicion. She would insist that he was being mistrustful for no reason. But listing all the things Sebastian was good at didn’t make him trust the guy any more, no matter how much Izzy kept offhandedly mentioning them to Alec.

Tough luck, but Alec was going to follow his gut with this one.

A short while ago he had ignored his suspicions, all the feelings that had screamed _wrong_ to him, just because it wasn’t logical. That had almost cost him Magnus, so no, he wasn’t going to smother these feelings without an extremely good reason.

“Correct me if I’m wrong–” Sebastian continues smoothly, “–but I just got a feel that we hadn’t gotten the best possible start here?”

_You’re absolutely right._

“What makes you think that?” Alec asks, evading the question. He wills himself to keep the awkward eye-contact even though he desperately wants to glance down at his papers. The tap of his pencil has become faster, too. Another nervous habit.

Alec blinks and stills his hand, fingers gripping the pen.

It takes surprisingly lot of concentration to keep his body in position, not to even talk about casual.

The soft chuckle from Sebastian is only managing to irate him further. “Well, I would completely understand that, actually. I know that you don’t trust me much. And I understand, you have a lot on your plate.”

Sebastian pulls away from the door, slowly making his way to the desk.

“I mean, you’re quite new in your position and the first thing you have to deal with is this mess. It must be exhausting. It isn’t any small responsibility…” he says and blows out some air. “I wouldn’t have enough to be in your place, I admit.”

Despite the urge to frown, Alec keeps his face neutral.

“Yeah, well, someone has to do the job,” he says after a while and stands up, piling up the scattered papers of his half-filled report. Sebastian made him restless and it’s not like he could concentrate enough to get anything done anyway.

He could continue later. It was only 9 a.m. – there was plenty of the day still left.

A small part of Alec scolds at himself for stretching it out, but it’s not like he didn’t have twenty other things that required his attention, too. The workload didn’t end by doing it.

Sebastian steps even closer, obviously sensing that this would be the end of their already short conversation.

“I don’t know if my opinion has any value here, but I think you’re the right man for the job,” he says, admiring glimmer in his eyes. “Seriously, not every man could fit into those shoes as well as you.”

Alec just nods curtly and walks around his desk. Not too suave, but in his current mental state he could definitely be ruder. Izzy should be proud of him.

“Thank you. Now, if that was all–”

Sebastian moves between him and the door with one sharp movement.

“One more thing, if you don’t mind?”

Alec fiddles with the papers in his hand. Honestly? He would rather be anywhere else at the moment. The constant grind of his teeth was starting to build an ache in his jaw.

“Sure.”

“Isabelle might have mentioned this to you before – and I’m not a fan of repetition – but I truly think that my knowledge about greater demons could help us with Azazel.”

Alec doesn’t like the way he says _us_. Like he’s assuming to be automatically part of it.

“All help is appreciated,” Alec answers, stoic and little dry. Truthfully, he’s a little desperate with the matter by now. “A formal paper would be great, if you have the time for it.”

Something darkens in Sebastian’s gaze, but it’s gone before Alec can read anything from it.

“Of course,” he flashes a smile and steps aside from blocking the door. “I would love to help in any way possible.”

 _Help who?_ Alec thinks as he walks out of the door.

 

* * *

 

**iii.**

_Alec loved control._

_It gave him a sense of clarity, provided some kind of order in his life. Especially when he was younger and the weird thoughts first started to mess with his head; when his eyes wouldn’t fall on soft curves but sharp hips and prominent Adam’s apples instead._

_The shame had burned hot in his throat; it had drawn his shoulders tight and created a permanent frown above his eyes._

_“What’s up with the face, brother?” Izzy used to ask him at the start. “You’re going to the get wrinkles, you know.”_

_But she didn’t understand. She might have known, from the way she looked at him, but she still didn’t understand._

_It was dangerous to smile at boys, dangerous to look at them too long, dangerous to talk with them too much, because every second you did that you could get caught. Somebody could see and realize what was going on inside of your twisted little head._

_So Alec learned to control it. Learned to lock his urges somewhere deep inside, learned to keep his face blank and heartbeat steady if his shoulder accidentally brushed against a boy with charming laugh._

_The rules were good. They were simple, no grey spaces, just right and wrong._

_Follow the law and you are safe._

_Easy._

_He doesn’t know what changes when he meets Magnus Bane._

_He doesn’t expect some catlike half-demon with seductive eyes and radiant smile to wreck his balance so thoroughly._

 

* * *

 

**iv.**

There’s a lot of blood. The smooth marble floor is slick with it.

Yet the thick scent of it doesn’t quite cover the sickening smell of ash underneath. Like burned flesh.

Alec pulls his jacket tighter around himself. As if it could shield him from the metallic tang that assaults his nostrils. No, it’s mostly an empty gesture, something to keep his hands from clenching into fists.

It’s a restaurant this time, not very big but extremely fancy and no doubt expensive. Seven bodies: three men, four women. Izzy is walking through them with a grave look on her face, her heels sharp and eyes even sharper.

They’re all slashed open with dozens of cuts from head to toe, bled dry from the longest ones near the arteries. They look deep enough to be the causes of deaths, but the experience from the previous instances make Alec doubt.

There will probably be internal bleedings, too. That’s what the forensic said the last time. _A brain hemorrhage_ , he remembers.

Alec doesn’t know if it’s meant to conceal the real reasons of the deaths, or if it’s merely just for fun.

Everybody’s working silently, mechanically. Clean the mess; gather up possible witnesses; fill the report; wait. That was the work with Azazel during the last few weeks.

“He just doesn’t slip up, does he,” Izzy murmurs from where she’s now crouched over one of the bodies. Alec watches with mild disgust as she snaps her latex gloves on and examines the still warm wound on the victim’s head.

He is fairly sure he can see some brain matter there.

“It’s a greater demon, Izzy,” he says as he turns away to lean over the next body, this one thankfully looking slightly less brutalized. “What did you expect?”

She blows air through her nose. “I don’t know,” she confesses under her breath, frustrated. “For it to be sloppier. For _us_ to be _better_.”

Alec hears the edge of self-accusation in her voice. Maybe recognizes it so well because he feels the weight of it, too.

He still has his report unfinished from the last one. Fuck, they barely managed it to lunch when the new alarm came in.

Alec simply didn’t have enough men to watch over the whole city. And trying to find Azazel when he was hiding was one big hit-and-miss program, destined to fail as they didn’t have a single lead. The demon vanished into the thin air after each hit, leaving no trail to follow.

“We can’t do this forever,” Izzy continues, softly enough for only Alec to hear. “We’re only lying to ourselves if we think that we’re closing in on him.”

Alec bites the inside of his cheek, looking down at the lacerated face next to his boot. She’s right, and he’s painfully aware of that.

“I know,” he says, equally quiet.

A slick sound erupts from Izzy’s direction. It sounds awfully like she’s _digging_ something from the body.

Alec is exceedingly glad that he isn’t seeing what she’s doing.

“Can’t you ask for help?” she asks after a while.

Alec’s shoulders slump. He feels defeated, losing a battle that has been unfair from the start. “From who?” he demands, a little too sharp. “Just say who, Izzy, I’m all ears.”

She hesitates briefly, then: “Can’t the Clave–?”

“No.”

She’s moving around somewhere behind his back, her voice now pitched even lower. “They’re not clean, Alec, I know, but if you only explained the situation to them–”

“I have explained,” Alec snaps.

He regrets it immediately, both for drawing unwanted attention and pushing Izzy away when she’s only trying to help. He turns around to face her again. He can see Marcus eyeing them in the corner of his eyes, and continues only after he’s sure that everybody’s attention is on the current task again.

His position is not stable enough for him to say these words aloud.

Not only being gay, but dating a warlock subverts the ground under his feet even more, gnawing his authority. He has heard the hushed words in the quiet corners of the Institute, although he has been glad to notice that it’s been more and more of a descending trend as the time goes by.

“I have explained this to them,” he continues, lower this time, eyes firmly on Izzy’s bloodied latex-gloves. “I have explained it many times, in ten different ways. They can’t help us. Or so they claim.”

The whole system was just too corrupted. Sometimes, in bad days, Alec thinks that he’s working for nothing, that it’s broken beyond fixing.

He can’t fight both Azazel and the Clave. Not alone, not at the same time. Catching Azazel is something concrete, something he can actually achieve at the moment. With the Clave, it feels like an entirely different kind of battlefield. A war that Alec isn’t even sure that he can win.

 _Small steps_ , he tries to remind himself, even though he’s sorely familiar with the fact that he doesn’t have the right weapons. He lacks the leverage, the age.

“Is Luke’s pack still reporting to you?” Izzy asks.

“Yeah,” Alec nods. “Nothing from them either. Got some scraps from Santiago’s clan, too,” he says the name dispassionately even though it brings a sour taste on his tongue. He swallows it down for her sake – she doesn’t need a reminder. “They know nothing more than we do. And Seelies aren’t even willing to think about cooperating.”

Izzy peels one of her copper-painted gloves off and clasps her fingers around Alec’s wrist. Her hand is warm.

“Hey,” she says softly, tone earnest to the bone. “I’m not criticizing. I know that you are doing everything you can, I never doubted that. No-one could’ve done better than you.”

Alec brushes his free hand over the scar on his brow. “Many could’ve done better than me.”

Izzy tightens her hold around his wrist, nails digging crescents into his skin. “Don’t sell yourself short,” she tells him.

Alec gives her a brief, one-sided smile, but it’s not until he nods when she finally uncurls her fingers around his hand.

It was nice that she believed in him so unquestionably, but it was also a bit of a burden. Alec doesn’t want to let her down. Well, he doesn’t want to let anyone down, but she was permanently very high on the list of people he wanted to make proud of.

“Well,” he drawls as he stands up, boots slipping slightly in the blood. “What do you think?”

Izzy digs her left hand – the one still gloved – deeper into slash on the corpse’s forehead. Her eyes are unfocused as she reads the damages with her touch, fingertips tracing the cracked bones and tissues.

“From a quick look, it seems to be like the others. The autopsy will say more, of course, but even now I can say that there are some weak signs of swelling in the brain.”

Alec nods, trusting in her opinion.

He turns to speak to Marcus, giving him detailed instructions how to cover everything up and move the bodies. Alec hasn’t worked much with him before, but he likes him. Marcus is calm and does meticulous work.

They are interrupted by a soft inhale; a gasp that quickly stretches into a high yelp.

Alec turns around to see Izzy stumbling backwards, cradling her hand against her chest.

He strides to her, cups her shoulders and kneels next to her. He sees nothing that could aggravate such a reaction from her, the body next to them just as dead as it had been as they arrived.

“What?” he asks, fingers digging through her leatherjacket. “What is it?”

She lifts her hand for Alec to see. Her remaining glove is burned at the fingertips, faint wisps of dark smoke still circling around her perfectly manicured nails.

Alec almost touches, but restrains himself. “Does it hurt?”

“No. No, just stung a little,” she swallows, “Alec, is it…?”

“I think so,” he whispers as he watches the remaining smoke disseminate into the air. Everybody’s quiet behind them.

He grips Izzy’s shoulders tighter. “I’ll call Magnus.”

 

* * *

 

**v.**

Magnus arrives half an hour later, portaling to the Institute straight from London. He has a box of the heavenly chocolate-cream candies that Alec can’t resist. He hands them to Alec while half-heartily complaining something about his diet being too strict anyway.

Alec can’t agree with that – he says so, too – but takes the treats anyway, secretly pleased.

After another half an hour, Magnus confirms their suspicions.

“It is magic,” he says, “no doubt. But it’s not a curse.”

His voice is thoughtful, his movements slightly slower than usual. He is leaning against the narrow metal tressle where one of the bodies is placed.

His jacket is thrown over the chair, leaving him only with a silken maroon button-up and a dark grey vest that emphasizes the sharpness of his waist very, very nicely. His hair is done moderately today, swirled up carelessly, no colorful highlights. He has only few rings on his fingers.

All of it looks a little mild for him, and Alec is tempted to ask if he needed to impress someone today, as he doesn’t see any other reason for this suddenly placid style.

It’s not abnormal for him, no. It’s more about the quickness of the change than anything else. Last few weeks Magnus had gone very over the top, uncaring of the heads that he turned.

Alec had learned that his daily appearance told surprisingly much about his mood.

“I’m not exactly sure what kind of magic it is or why it was placed here,” Magnus says, eyeing the waxy, blood-drained face below. “Could’ve been mistake but somehow I doubt that.”

Alec doubts, too. Can’t see why Azazel would slip up now.

“I can’t read it well,” Magnus continues, voice dropping a tad. His forefinger keeps tapping rhythmically against the metal. “It feels foreign. Doesn’t answer to me.”

His brow is creased in concentration. He looks weary, the shadows under his eyes dark and deep. The makeup doesn’t hide the fact that he’s tired.

“What’s your opinion?” Alec steps closer. “Should we be worried? So far only Izzy has touched it.”

He doesn’t like asking.

Even though he knows that he has to.

Even though Magnus needs to know about anomalies like this.

Magnus had given him many noteworthy advices before, but Alec didn’t want to lean on him too much. Even less now. He had tried to find answers on his own and give Magnus some space to recover. As his boyfriend, it might be Magnus’ pledge to support him, but not to do his job.

Izzy was supporting, but her responsibility was much smaller, which created a small ravine between them. She didn’t understand all the bureaucracy Alec had to face every single day. And Jace was actually even smaller help. He was thinking like a soldier, viewing every fight as a small war and easily forgetting the bigger picture.

Magnus was the only one who truly seemed to understand. He was the one with decades of experience in leading and he understood the worries that Alec often carried home with him. Yet Alec still feels like he’s using him.

He hasn’t thought it wrong before, but now, with Magnus’ eyes so exhausted and vacant, it doesn’t feel good.

Magnus shakes his head. “I don’t think it’s a threat, no. I would like some time to study it more, though.”

Alec nods. He’s craving to touch Magnus but restrains himself, annoyed by the evaluating eyes that are judging their professionalism like hawks.

“Sure, of course. I’ll make sure that you can work in peace.” He says the last part with a meaningful glance at the others, signing them to leave.

All four of them leave, Marcus last, lingering on the doorway and giving them a stiff glance before slipping through. Alec doesn’t intend to ask about it. If Marcus had a problem with them, he could come and say it to his face. Alec had taken these critiques before and hadn’t shattered from them.

They listen the retreating steps for a while before Alec goes and closes the door. The sense of privacy feels liberating.

Magnus gives him a small smile when he walks back.

Alec steps next to him so they’re standing side by side, and opens his hand, palm up. Magnus accepts the invitation and slides his hand over Alec’s, curling their fingers together. The harsh light of the institute is cutting though his lashes, making his rich skin look paler than it actually is. He still looks beautiful, though.

Alec wonders how he does it.

“You don’t have to do this, you know. You don’t have to strain yourself for nothing,” he says after a while. “If you say that it’s harmless, then it’s harmless. I trust you.”

“I know,” Magnus says as he strokes the back of Alec’s hand. “But I actually want to. I’m curious.”

It’s an answer Alec expected to hear. Magnus didn’t do things for people to butter them up. Not that Alec needed any adulation anyway; he was already too deep in Magnus’ web.

He wouldn’t find his way back from the depths of Magnus’ eyes even if he tried.

“Okay,” Alec murmurs. “Are you good here? Do you need anything?”

Magnus lifts their joined hands and presses his lips against Alec’s knuckles. “I’m fine, cintaku. Thank you,” he affirms quietly.

“Okay.”

Alec knows that Magnus is insanely powerful. That he could crack bones with a single low-whispered word, cast wards with a flick of his wrist, burn until the ground was gray with ash. He could do all that while holding the same calm, calculated demeanor.

Alec knows this, but sometimes Magnus didn’t look like it.

Sometimes, like now, he looks stretched thin; weirdly hollow with his dry lips and the redness around his eyes.

“Did you sleep enough?” Alec asks, although he knows that it’s for nothing. Magnus is too stubborn to admit that he might actually need something, _someone_.

Magnus shrugs and leans in to peck Alec on the lips. Alec returns the kiss, hand tightening around Magnus’.

“You are sleeping tonight,” Alec says when they part. Magnus smiles as if he knows that Alec isn’t being serious. He is, though. No matter how soft his words are. “No alcohol. No work. Bath and tea and sex; those are the only things you are allowed tonight.”

Magnus grins a little wider, looking absolutely sure that he can bypass these small demands.

“Okay,” he says anyway, eyes dark. “Does it have to be in that specific order, or can we improvise?”

Alec catches his mouth again, bites gently into Magnus’ lower lip. “We can improvise,” he murmurs against Magnus’ mouth.

Magnus laughs briefly, soundlessly, making Alec’s stomach twist with a gold-lined pleasure. Then he ushers Alec away, claiming that they both had work to do. Alec leaves with a promise to stop by later, gaze lingering on Magnus as the said man starts to roll up his sleeves.

Alec does stop by, later, as he promised.  

More often than he wants to admit.

 

* * *

 

**vi.**

_The first time Alec sees him they’re at Pandemonium, surrounded by loud music and sweaty bodies._

_It’s only a hazy silhouette through the thick air what Alec sees of the warlock. He’s tall next to Clary, sharp shoulders and spiked hair. From what it looks like, the discussion isn’t going well._

_Alec rolls his eyes and tightens his grip on the bow. It doesn’t take more than few minutes before he has to use it. Only once, though: the demon is dead in seconds and Alec is moving before its ashes even touch the floor._

_When he finally lifts his eyes up, he pretends that it’s the beat of the bass thrumming through his chest, not his heart fluttering with a few extra beats._

_The warlock looks at him intensively, the black kohl around his eyes making his dark gaze seem even deeper._

**_Look away, look away_** _; Alec thinks hurriedly, mouth suddenly dry as he acts like he doesn’t hear the quiet “who are you?”_

_It was a moment of weakness, Alec thinks later. It won’t happen again._

_Except that it does._

 

* * *

 

**vii.**

Alec strips off his gear-belt and bow, hanging them up to the coat rack next to the door.

He feels fucking beaten.

Even a shower sounds insurmountable, no matter how much he craves the hot water to loosen up his muscles. Maybe he could just take one in the morning? Ask Magnus to remove the well-ingrained blood and grime from the lines of his palms for now.

“Straight to bed?” he asks, hoping that Magnus isn’t clinging to his promise about bath and other activities.

“Sounds good to me,” Magnus says as he slides off his own jacket. He is immediately heading for the crystal decanter on the coffee table, eyes focused on the amber-colored liquor filling it. “Do you want to eat something before? You’ve had a long day. Nothing too heavy, although Ethiopian sounds very tempting…”

He trails off in mid-sentence, feet halting.

Alec stops too, confounded by the sudden dip in the ambience. An unnerving weight settles quickly in the bottom of his stomach, a feeling that should be a bad omen on its own.

He doesn’t see Magnus’ face, but then again, he doesn’t exactly need to. The suddenly stiff curve of the warlock’s back tells him just enough.

The living room looks untouched, tranquil even. Not a single item seems to be out of place.

Alec knows better than to fall for the first impression, though. It has tricked him too many times in the past.

Mentally cursing himself for leaving his bow in the hallway, he reaches for his stele instead. With a swift but inconspicuous gesture he draws it from the backpocket of his jeans, exceedingly careful to keep the noise of his movements in bare minimum.

He considers about going back to retrieve his weapon but something roots him in the plush carpet.

Sure he still has his tight holster and the small blade strapped into it, but for him it’s a ruefully small comfort. His confidence with daggers is moderate at best. He hates to let the enemies so close, preferring a sword in the necessary hand-to-hand combats.

The distance gives him control.

Control as well as time.

And time, in situations like this, could be crucial.

He doesn’t take his eyes away from the empty room as he activates his runes, locating them on the skin by memory. Hearing first. Then sight. Speed. Strength. Agility.

He almost expects to hear the reason for Magnus’ suspicion. A quiet press of boots against the mahogany floor, perhaps? Clothes chafing together? An additional pair of lungs breathing in the dense air of the apartment?

He hears nothing.

That alone makes his skin crawl.

Something about their stillness resembles him of two deer; doe-eyed and frozen, waiting for the lion’s attack. It’s a disturbing, unnecessary thought – an agitation Alec can’t seem to shake off his back.

He wants to ask if Magnus knows what’s happening. If he can explain this inauspicious hunch or if he’s just as clueless as Alec; stuck with only a covert feeling of something being wrong.

His lips stay sealed together.

Instead he takes a careful step forward to press his palm against Magnus’ lower back. It’s for a silent assurance; a communication that doesn’t require words. He doesn’t dare to think about moving further than that, afraid of breaking the stagnant mood that felt eerily like their last defense.

_Defense against what?_

Magnus tenses for a second before relaxing to the touch – something that Alec barely notices.

All his effort goes to the struggle to bite back the sigh that wants to escape his lungs.

The low voltage of magic is momentarily incapacitating, crashing in like a tidal wave, pulling him under, overwhelming. Not strong enough to hurt, no, but definitely strong enough to throw Alec off his game.

It’s coming off in slow waves from Magnus’ skin, radiating through the dark fabric of his jacket. It resonates in the small bones of Alec’s hand, much like electricity, coruscating faintly even in the base of his spine.

It’s something Alec has never felt from Magnus before.

Hand clasped around his stele, Alec forces his body to stay still as he comes down from his sudden high.

It happens surprisingly fast despite the intensively of it. After mere seconds the muting veil is lifting from his senses. Everything becomes louder again. Brighter. Sharper.

It’s a heady sensation, like finally breaking the surface of the ocean and gasping in a lungful of air.

It feels a lot like invincibility, but Alec knows better than to let it fool himself.

He swallows, fingers tightening around the thin, metallic grip of his stele.

Despite the mild ache of his skin, he is starting to feel almost suspiciously good. Great, even. Magnus hasn’t moved at all, spine and hips rigid under Alec’s barely grazing touch. Alec can still hear his slightly elevated heartbeat and steady breathing, but it’s not only that anymore.

Now, with every inhale, Alec can actually hear Magnus’ lungs expanding. With every exhale, he sees the fine-grained molecules that swirl hypnotically in the air before Magnus’ lips.

He is quite sure that if he now nocked an arrow and fired, it would fly twice as fast and thrice as far.

It’s an intoxicating feeling, one that Alec immediately suppresses. Foolish self-confidence was very different from the practical recognition of true strength. He couldn’t afford to misread his own abilities now.

Magnus’ head is moving more prominently now, gaze roaming over the spacious living-room. From the closed doors of the balcony to the opening arch of the kitchen and back to the balcony again. If he’s able to see something that Alec can’t, he doesn’t do anything to inform about it.

Alec wonders briefly if Magnus even realizes what he’s doing. If he notices the slow waves of magic he’s emanating into the air, _into Alec._

Or is this the moment Alec finally sees his unwavering control slipping?

It’s both unnerving and hypnotic, and for a second he plays with the idea that Magnus is simply mistaken.

That it’s nothing. That no-one is lurking them behind these quiet corners. Who could get inside anyway? Through all the wards and protective spells Magnus had created to ensure the safety of this apartment, there must be very few who would want to even try.

Alec is half-way through convincing himself with all those very logical arguments when something happens. Something that effectively obliterates every reason why he wanted to believe this wasn’t as bad as it initially seemed.

Magnus’ pulse speeds up.

Nearly imperceptibly, perhaps, but fuck if that isn’t the final push that settles the cold terror in Alec’s bones.

“We need to leave,” Magnus breathes out, almost frantic, words too quick and too quiet.

The portal appears next to them before Magnus gets to the end of his short sentence. The low, golden glow of it promises a quick escape, casting strange and deep shadows on the walls even in the well-lit room. Magnus is already turning around, urging Alec to get through it–

Squeezing his stele and grasping Magnus’ wrist in his other hand, Alec moves.

There’s the same electrifying buzz as he touches Magnus again, just a notably less intense this time. Thank god for that. Relief tastes good, quickly replacing the sourness on Alec’s tongue. Whatever threat Magnus had sensed here would be left behind, just a few steps–

The portal vanishes away before either of them gets through it.

Alec swallows, fear lodging itself to the most narrow part of his throat. He doesn’t want to know the color of his knuckles as he squeezes Magnus’ wrist, helplessly watching as the portal disintegrates into grey ash that falls heavily to their feet.

He knew that ash. He knew that sickening smell of burned skin that came along it.

He knew who it came from.

“Why such a rush?”

The smooth voice sends a chill down Alec’s spine. It’s tragicomically ironic, isn’t it, just how much he wants gone the very person he has been so desperate to hunt down from the begin with?

“I swear, all people do these days is run around. Just stop for a moment. Calm down. _Carpe diem_ and all that shit.”

Magnus is already turning towards the voice, forcing Alec to move with him if he didn’t wish to let go – something that’s definitely out of question. Miles and miles over every fucking line Alec had ever drawn in his head.

Except that Magnus doesn’t seem to have the same lines with him.

He is swiftly untangling himself from Alec’s steely hold, tendrils of magic circling both of their wrists until Alec is simply incapable of controlling his hand anymore and Magnus slips from his grip. Alec grits his teeth together, feeling unfairly betrayed.

The magic isn’t hurting him in any way, no. It’s the psychological punch that does the damage.

“Azazel,” Magnus greets, voice clinical and façade calm again. There’s no sign of his recent distress. “It’s been a while.”

Azazel is sitting on one of Magnus’ plush armchairs, shoulders relaxed and legs crossed lazily at knees, expression almost bored. There’s a pull in the corners of his lips, a smile that doesn’t reach his equivocal eyes.

He looks awfully like one those predatory men who disguised themselves in expensive suits and sat down in the corner of an elegant bar, seduction and danger written equally all over their features.

“A while indeed,” Azazel drawls out. Something like satisfaction glints briefly in his cold gaze.

Alec doesn’t fail to notice how Magnus oh, so subtly, steps right between him and the Greater Demon, making the bodily shield look wholly unintentional.

And that’s not good, no, _fuck_ – that’s not good at all. Seeing Magnus under the dark scrutiny of the demon makes Alec’s insides twist, the unforgiving worry in his chest almost bordering anger. He wants to pull Magnus back and ingrain into his thick, self-sacrificing skull that he wasn’t alone in this god’s forsaken situation.

Logically – _logically_ – Alec knows that there’s absolutely nothing he can do now. A set-up as dangerous as this required discretion, and between the two of them, Magnus was the one with even some kind of chance of getting them out alive.

Knowing that doesn’t help. Not really.

“Well, are you going to offer me no refreshments?” Azazel inquires. Casually, as if he was just an old friend stopping by. “I really thought I could count on your hospitality.”

Magnus nods at the glass of scotch on the coffee table, surrounded by the same foreboding ash.

“Looks like you already took care of that side on your own.”

A grin pulls Azazel’s lips. “Oh come on, Magnus, I know he taught you better than this,” he rebukes with a low voice. “It’s all about the gesture.”

“My mistake,” Magnus says back, tone still perfectly impassive.

The smile on Azazel’s face only widens. It’s almost mocking, the way he leans for the glass before settling comfortably against the backrest again, swirling the amber liquid with a languid rolls of his wrist. Ice keeps chinking quietly against the glass as he takes a sip.

The eerie way he never blinks or looks away from Magnus is driving Alec to the walls.

It’s like he’s playing a game.

A sick and twisted game Alec still doesn’t know the rules of.

“So, how’s the world been up here?” Azazel asks, still offering that unfaltering smile of his. It looks anything but friendly, though, with canines glinting in the warm light of the living room. “Still many lost souls crawling up your doorsteps, desperate for remedy, hm? I’ve heard you’re continuing to hold on to that open door policy of yours.”

Alec admits, Azazel’s face sure filled society’s criterions of handsome with the symmetrical face, straight nose, full lips, and sharp cheekbones. Yet under all that charm and casualness brews something phantasmal; a soul so disturbingly dark that even in his human flesh he looks every bit of the demon he is.

“I don’t think it’s an open door policy if I get to choose who gets inside,” Magnus says. “Today seems to be an exception.”

Azazel’s smile drops, rending the bottom of Alec’s stomach down with it.

It’s his eyes, Alec suddenly realizes. Cold and unearthly bottomless, every drop of humanity drained away from them.

“Careful, Magnus,” a manic nuance borders Azazel’s soft-spoken words, “what would daddy say if he heard you behaving like this?”

The words have an instant effect on Magnus. He tenses even further, air stilling in his lungs.

Alec frowns, trying to understand what he’s missing here. Surely Azazel couldn’t mean Magnus’ dad as in his actual, demonic father…?

“Whatever you’re after, I doubt that you’ll find it in my apartment.”

Magnus doesn’t say it aloud, but they all know what item he means. It was already one big, hazardous running-contest to the Cup, a chase that showed no indications of ending any time soon.

Azazel’s smile reappears as suddenly as it had disappeared. The new look in his eyes is almost fond, reassuring in the most twisted way. His unblinking gaze never once leaves Magnus, thumb mechanically rubbing against the rim of his half-empty scotch glass.

“Oh, Magnus. _Come on_.”

There’s something deeply ominous in those sudden mood shifts of his. Depraved and dangerous in their unpredictability. The energy shifts oddly around him, like a fallacious serenity middling with the dark thunder-filled clouds.

The short silence feels toxic, unsafe. Alec is almost relieved when Azazel finally leans forward and ends it.

“I really thought you would understand the rules here. If you didn’t want to play, then you should have stayed behind the sidelines.”

Magnus answers calmly to Azazel’s intent gaze, a small thing that Alec feels surprisingly proud of.

“I’m not playing anything.”

The coldness seeps in the edges of Azazel’s expression again, his hollow smile faltering slightly. With him, it doesn’t look like an act of weakness, though. There’s a humorless finality in his voice when he speaks again.

“The Cup, Magnus.”

Magnus shrugs. “I don’t have it.”

Alec forces himself to stand still, unable to do anything for the tension that keeps building. His skin is still abrading uncomfortably against the rough material of his shirt as he shifts on his feet. The faint ache seems to be concentrating on a certain places of his body, like a chunks of ice pressed against his runes, never quite melting or–

_Oh._

It’s not his skin that keeps pulsating with this strange energy. It’s his runes.

So he didn’t imagine the magnification of his senses.

Azazel downs the rest of his drink with one go before setting it on the table again, the clink of the glass drawing Alec’s focus back to him. The empty drink vanishes, leaving the same gray ash in its wake. Azazel stands up.

“Here’s the thing, Magnus,” he says, slowly re-buttoning his suit as he gets closer. _Too close._ “Whether you wanted or not, there’s no way out of this. Not for you.”

His hand comes to rest on Magnus’ shoulder, gesture almost fatherly except from the way his thumb gently caresses the skin above the collar of Magnus’ charcoal jacket. The threat of the touch is unmercifully clear and it takes all of Alec’s willpower to keep the distance.

He wants to see the demon’s blood on the walls, wants to be the one to spill it, because Azazel has no fucking right to touch Magnus like that.

Alec clenches his jaw. He misses the textured handle of his bow against his fingers, desperately craves the security that it provides. He wants to pull Magnus away and run. To hide him into the deepest corner of the world and keep him there forever.

But Magnus stays, keeping his ground.

Alec wishes that he wouldn’t.

“I do not wish to hurt you,” Azazel continues, “you know that. You’re his favorite, Magnus.”

His tactic is clever, Alec admits. Corner the prey with a promise of death, then offer scraps of mercy and wait them to strive for it desperately.

“I don’t owe you anything.” There’s no fear wavering the strength of Magnus’ voice. “My end of the deal was to give you Valentine, nothing else.”

Azazel shakes his head again, disappointed. “See, that’s where you’re wrong,” he says, “your end of the deal was to give me the Cup, and if it’s through Valentine or not, is not my problem.”

Alec is mostly behind Magnus, the angle unfavorable, but he can still see the slight clench in Magnus’ jaw. “Well, yours was to give us Isabelle–”

“Who I would have given to you if she had been in my possession.”

“Just like I would have given the Cup if I’d I have it.”

There’s a defending quality in Magnus’ tone that makes Azazel still. It was a bold move, even Alec knows that. Appealing to the literary pig-holes of their contract.

Inhaling deeply, Azazel leans even closer, nose almost brushing the hollow under Magnus’ cheekbone and God, _Alec hates it_. How close he is to Magnus, how downright sexual their position would seem if not for the lethal mock in Azazel’s features.

Alec despises it almost enough to open his mouth and agree the terms that the demon was throwing on them.

“Clever, my dear boy. So very clever,” he smiles sharply, like a wolf, eyes widening once for a dramatic effect. There’s no mad glint in them now – something that should be relieving but is actually the furthest thing from it.

The lack of fire in his eyes is actually way more unsettling than the previous, deadly burn in them.

The light isn’t reflecting his gaze or adducing the different colors in his eyes like with normal people. As if the pupils had swallowed irises; an absolute, bone-chilling darkness that no light can penetrate.

The weight in Alec’s stomach is starting to get uncomfortably immense, filling his insides until it has no way to go except up, clawing his throat. Alec wants to throw it up. Wants to get the carnal fear out of his system.

Magnus is subtly starting to lean away from Azazel, feet rooted to the carpet but spine straightening backwardly and face tilting just a little more to the side.

And, for Alec’s dismay, for every inch Magnus slopes away, Azazel follows.

“You should know better than to play these games with me,” the demon berates, low in his throat, fingers digging into the meat of Magnus’ shoulder. “The woman for the Cup, that was our deal, yes? The fact that I didn’t possess her doesn’t change your end one bit. Besides, you have her now. Do you see me holding the Cup?”

Magnus stays silent for a few seconds, then; “I can’t help you with this.”

Azazel leans in even further, lips brushing against the skin next to Magnus’ ear. “I wasn’t asking,” he whispers, too close to Magnus to look at him in the eye, so he looks past him instead.

His unholy obsidian eyes drill straight into Alec’s, and God, it’s too much. He’s too close to Magnus, crawling up under Alec’s skin, _mocking_ –

A voice echoes under the rush of blood in his ears. For some strange reason it belongs to Jace. His imaginary words are filled with their usual well-refined poise and cockiness. Always so confident, even against the odds.

_Don’t lose your shit now, Alec._

_But what to do, what to do–?_

_Not now, come on._

Alec closes his fingers around the handle of his dagger, the weapon still secured against his thigh, wondering if he would be fast enough to attack. His runes continue to ache with the excessive power they provided, urging him to move and make a good use of them.

If not for Magnus between them, standing in the line of fire, Alec would have probably given it a chance.

He might be fast enough to assail Azazel, but fast enough to push Magnus out of the way before? Fast enough for him to make sure Azazel would be down before he could release his rage on either of them? He isn’t so sure.

Azazel might not have given Alec much attention during the conversation but Alec wasn’t foolish enough to think that he wasn’t very aware of Alec’s presence.

And Alec just couldn’t risk Magnus like that.

Ironic, how Magnus’ shield for Alec was now working on both ways, preventing also Alec from attacking.

“You can’t squirm out of this,” Azazel says as he begins to pull away. His eyes stray back to Magnus’ face, hand coming up to his cheek and cupping it. It doesn’t last long – his thumb caresses the skin under Magnus’ eye only twice before he retreats completely and steps away – but fuck, every damned second is too long for Alec to witness.

“Fine,” Magnus gives in quietly.

Alec lets out the breath he has been holding. Relief lifts some of the rocks that had been spreading into his lungs.

He wants to believe that Magnus knew what he had been doing when he pushed like that. He had yielded, yes, but only after stretching his luck further than it should be possible. Azazel’s patience seemed to be an alterable thing, the sufficiency of it constantly changing. A thin ice Magnus had been walking on.

Alec is endlessly thankful it hadn’t cracked.

“What should I do?” Magnus ask and takes a step backwards. “I have no idea where the Cup could be.”

Azazel tilts his head.

“I’ve heard you made the wards for the Institute. You created them by yourself?” he asks, a question he obviously doesn’t want an answer to. The proud hint in his words is not quite covering the annoyance underneath. “A marvelous job, I admit,” he purrs, “very… _abiding_.”

Then, for the second time during their whole encounter, he breaks his inhuman gaze from Magnus.

“But for your question,” he sighs and turns towards the huge painting on the wall, “there are items that I need from there. Items that could help me to track down the Cup.”

Alec’s fingers – thoughtlessly tracing against the strap that’s holding his blade – still.

Azazel couldn’t get into the Institute; the damage he would do there was too immoderate. His sister was there, vulnerable and totally unprepared for this. Jace, Max, his parents. Everyone he knows since he was a child, everyone he had ever trained with, fought with, shared his quiet meals with–

Magnus’ eyes flash. “What items?”

Azazel’s nails scratch against the old painting until they stop at something. A small polaroid picture – barely peaking behind the sleek golden frame – is slowly pulled out and inspected. Alec knows what picture it is. He was there when it was taken. He is _in it_ , damn it.

Azazel’s smile widens. His thumb grazes slowly against the sleek surface of the picture. “Just get me in,” he says, tone pleasant but threatening. Warning not to dig too deep.

Alec unfastens the simple trap that keeps his dagger fastened. Something catches his attention before he gets to draw it out, though; a flicker of furious red, so small that it could have very easily gotten overlooked.

It’s on the tips of Magnus’ fingertips. A liquid fire, violent and aggressive; an alliteration for the wave that was going to follow. The color of his magic – ruby red with golden edges – is dangerous but also so beautifully clear and untarnished.

So different from the pitch black, rotten reek that had followed Azazel’s spells.

“If that’s what you wish,” Magnus says at Azazel’s partially turned back, the conformation of his voice in deep contradiction with the defiant expression in his face.

They are close to the crescendo here, Alec can feel it.

He isn’t the only one.

Azazel tenses, picture suddenly forgotten. His head twist unnaturally fast around to see them. There’s frustration and rage lingering like a dark shadow around his eyes and the growl that follows freezes the air in Alec’s lungs, more demonic than Alec has yet heard from him.

And it’s saying Magnus’ name.

Alec pulls out the blade and throws it.

It hits Azazel square in the chest with a sickening crunch, cracking through the sternum with the mere force of the hit.

Azazel staggers backwards. His breath begins to wheeze and gurgle almost immediately, air blocked by the tip of the knife as well as the gushing blood in his windpipe. The inky blood is quickly accumulating in his mouth, dripping through the clench of his white teeth and staining his lips as it trickles down on his chin.

And he is still standing.

_How the fuck is he still standing?_

It’s been only few seconds since the hit, sure, but no one should be up after a stab like that. It was meant to be fatal for fuck’s sake. The dark spot on Azazel’s chest keeps rapidly expanding and yet there’s no faltering, no indication that he was going down.

A nauseating thought breaches Alec’s burgeoning confusion.

_What if he had done no damage at all?_

Then, as if the gods above wanted to prove his suspicions right, Azazel looks at Alec. His gaze is filled with an abysmal hunger for death, white teeth almost wholly covered with blood as his upper lip moves up for a snarl.

Yet the first thing that rushes through Alec’s mind, besides the paralyzing panic, is **yes**.

If the alternative was the demon’s undivided focus on Magnus, Alec would gladly take this. Actually, the longer he could keep that focus on himself, the better. Rather him than Magnus.

The red lightning crackles sonorously, cutting through the still air.

Alec crouches and covers his eyes from the blinding force of it. The surge of unrestricted magic might not be directed at him, but the wave of pressure is still remarkable. Blinking against the dry, hot torrent of it, Alec quickly refocuses at the source of it.

His stomach lurches at the sight.

Magnus’ magic looks almost volatile. The electric, crystalline tendrils of it are coming from somewhere deeper than usual, not limited to his palms or fingertips.

Nearly transparent veins start from Magnus’ chest, pulsing over his shoulders and biceps and converging together at his forearms and wrists. His eyes are unglamoured, arms shaking from the force of the destructive power he is unleashing, stronger than Alec has never seen from him before.

That’s why it’s so hard for Alec to keep the suffocating weight off from his chest.

_Because it’s not enough._

The darkness that has spread around Azazel is engulfing. The ash is back, covering the floor and floating around them. There’s a gaunt look in the demon’s face, his chest a dark void where Magnus’ magic is currently striking at.

Or trying to.

Most of the furious electricity is succumbing just before it can get to its target, the red of it dying into black and ashen fog. Made inefficient. The only good aspect is that it seems to take a lot of Azazel’s strength too, although Alec doubts that Magnus can keep him at bay for a much longer.

Not at this rate and the amount of energy he is using.

Alec’s thoughts go back to his bow.

It’s left on the level on intention as Magnus jerks his elbow back at Alec and an invisible force pushes him back. It’s familiar strength, rough with the desperation.

He wishes that he had looked at Magnus, but the last image that burns into his brains is Azazel. Azazel who’s stepping forward with a renewed rage, spit and blood flying as he screams something at Magnus, something that Alec can’t hear anymore. His jaw moves unnaturally, looking like it could unhinge just so he could swallow them all in the pits of his wrath.

A pressure envelopes Alec, but that’s not the reason he can’t breathe.

Magnus was left behind.

The ache in his chest isn’t even close to the mild breathlessness that the usual portaling leaves him with. No, his lungs truly burned; like he couldn’t get any air, panic swelling behind his Adam’s apple and blocking the only way in.

Magnus was left behind. _He was left b–_

The unyielding silence lasts only a second before he is through, falling back first on the ground. The impact of it does actually a sufficient job at knocking some much needed oxygen past his spasming throat.

After gasping in as much of the crisp air as possible, Alec stumbles back on his feet. His eyes search frantically for the portal. If it was still there, he could get back. He could get back to Magnus and pull him out of there. Out of Azazel’s reach and away from his obtrusive gaze. _He could. He had to._

And there it was, only ten feet away. Magnus’ portal.

Glistening over the wet and green grass like a holy redemption.

Alec strives at it.

He is almost in when a gush of ash comes through it, hitting him in the face. It stings painfully in his eyes, dry and coarse, but he wills himself to blink it away and continue, desperate to make it back.

As he’s still fumbling for the portal something collides hard and fast against his chest.

It’s a solid weight, one that knocks him down again. The pain in his eyes stops him from opening them so he almost fights it in his current state of temporary blindness before he recognizes the sharp bones and sleek muscles that press against his body.

“Alec–” a breathless voice gasps against his neck, arms trembling against Alec’s sides where Magnus is immediately trying to get up. Alec grips at his waist, anxious not to lose him again.

A terrible, hair-rising screeching fills the chilly air before the relief has more time to kick in.

The ash comes out of nowhere, swerving violently in the air and getting into Alec’s mouth and slipping under his clothes. He tries to cough them out but it’s only making it worse. Magnus’ breath is coming in short huffs against his neck, shaky hands clasping almost painfully around Alec’s biceps.

Alec just squeezes his eyes shut tighter and grips at Magnus’ sides, fingertips digging into the narrow spaces between Magnus’ rib-bones. He considers about flipping them around, just so he could get Magnus under him.

A bad cover is a cover anyway.

The shrilling noise intensifies, cutting through Alec’s brains and throbbing behind his closed eyelids. Magnus’ grip around his biceps crosses the border of pain as his magic starts percolating from his palms. It seeps through the thick fabric of Alec’s jacket, burning like fire against his skin.

Despite the growing pain of it, all of Alec’s concern stays on the fact that he can’t see Azazel.

He can’t open his eyes, and even if he could, he doubts that he would see anything through the ashen storm that was swirling around them. He had no way of foreseeing the direction where the attacks would come from. He also has no idea where they were, cue on not taking in much of his surroundings when he landed.

He truly had all the disadvantages.

With a sharp movement he changes their positions, pressing Magnus now against the moist grass.

“No Alec, _no_ –,” Magnus gasps under him, fumbling to pull him closer. There’s an edge of panic Alec has never heard in his voice before. “Stay still Alec, you _need_ _to_ _stay_ _still–_ ”

Magnus’ voice fades out first.

The familiar pressure is what comes next, compressing Alec’s bones and congealing his blood. Magnus is moving the portal over them, he realizes. Both of them now, thank god.

Magnus starts to slip from his grip as soon as the pull of the portal’s current takes over, and oh, _no_ – no fucking way. Alec holds on tighter. He is only lightly worried that he will do some damage; break or bruise something in Magnus’ body in this rune-fueled state of his.

It’s not a pleasant alternative but the absolutely last thing he will do is to let go again.

They’re through quickly.

Humid air hits Alec’s face and he gasps it in, greedily, heart fluttering painfully fast in his chest. They’re still on the ground, but it’s a different material this time: hard and dry, coarse sand pressing against Alec’s palm where it slips from Magnus’ waist to keep the balance.

The portal disappears. Alec hears it.

The scathing fear doesn’t go out with it.

Magnus is still under him. Although Alec can’t see it, with the way their bodies are currently pressed together, he can clearly feel the way Magnus’ head lolls back and to the side. Only his heavy breathing is telling Alec that he was still conscious.

Careful not to knock or fall against Magnus, Alec pushes himself up to his knees. The pain in his eyes is becoming more and more unbearable as the ash keeps chafing against the retina behind his lids.

“Magnus?”

Magnus breathes out a noise that sounds both question and affirmation.

“Magnus,” he tries again, little shakily, hands hovering close to his face but afraid to touch, “I can’t – Magnus, I can’t see–”

Magnus is up faster than Alec anticipates.

“Let me see…” he breathes, voice tight with worry. His grip is gentle when he guides Alec’s hands out of the way, touch slow and soothing.

“Is there something in them?” Magnus asks as he cups Alec’s face with one hand and traces his cool fingers against his scarred brow with other.

“Ash,” Alec croaks out. He is unable to keep in the flinch when Magnus’ touch goes a little too near to his closed eye.

“Sorry,” Magnus murmurs, fingers coming to brush back some of the mussed hair that has fallen on Alec’s forehead. Then, with some quickly mumbled words, he presses his whole palm against Alec’s temple. Something cold starts to spread from his touch, ceasing the pain immediately.

The raw pressure of the ash stays, but it isn’t worrying Alec too much anymore. Magnus would make it better.

He sighs out his relief, shoulders relaxing.

“I’ll clean them now,” Magnus rasps out, then clears his throat. Alec can hear him shifting to a better position. “I doubt that it’ll hurt, probably just feel uncomfortable. Prepare yourself for that.”

Alec does the slightest of nods, bracing himself.

Magnus hands come on Alec’s face again, palms against his cheeks and thumbs resting just under his clenched eyes, leaving the rest of the fingers spread along Alec’s jaw.

The magic is like cold water gliding over Alec’s raw eyeballs, cool sensation of it salvaging but also strong enough to border uncomfortable, irritating against the sensitive surface of his eyes. Still not painful, just like Magnus promised.

“Okay,” Magnus mutters after a while, face so close that his breath ghosts over Alec’s lips.

Alec carefully cracks his eyes open.

Cautiously blinking few times, he tests the feel of them. They’re still slightly sore, as if he’d been looking at dry wind for hours, but the dull ache is nowhere near the previous pain of it.

Magnus’ hands fall from his face and Alec notices that his cheeks are wet, lids gliding over his retinas easily. The substance feels too thick to be tears, though. More like gel.

“Better?” Magnus asks quietly.

The details of his face are slowly becoming sharper in Alec’s vision. He keeps blinking. “Yes.”

“They look a little red,” Magnus says, thumb grazing under Alec’s left eye once more. “It should pass.”

Alec nods again and mouths out _thanks_ before starting to take in their surroundings.

The sky above them is pale blue and free from clouds, allowing the sun to parch over them without hindrance. They’re crouching in the middle of a small sand-road that’s skirted with a few trees and bushes. It must be some kind of a mountain or a hill, road sloping down to the point Alec can’t follow.

“Where are we?” he asks as he wipes the remaining moisture from his face, not quite daring to touch anywhere near his eyes.

Magnus stands up. “Girona.”

Alec frowns up at him, “Spain?”

Magnus hums and bends down to help Alec up.

Thoughts whirring, Alec takes the extended hand that’s offered and hauls himself up. His mind is still all but composed as the fumes of fear keep scattering his fragmented thoughts around. With some difficulties he wills himself to calm down, beginning to organize them with a patience he doesn’t have.

“Can he get to the Institute?” he asks almost immediately, worry for Izzy, Max, and Jace resurfacing. His hand keeps going reflexively over his shoulder, body not quite taking on what his mind has realized a good while ago. God, he misses his bow like a limb. “Can he get through your wards?”

Magnus looks at him, lips dry and eyes oddly pale. He shakes his head, “No. The Institute’s wards are based on a totally different kind of magic. And there are several layers. They’re meant to keep all demon-blooded out unlike the ones at my apartment.” He flashes a smile, though it’s a weak one, “Same wards wouldn’t be very logical if you consider my–”

Alec has stopped listening.

“Are you bleeding?” he cuts in, trying to focus his blurred sight on the dark patch under Magnus’ ear. His stomach twists. “Is that blood? Magnus?”

Magnus looks perplexed, mouth gaping as he glances down at his body and hands.

“No. No, I–”

With two quick steps Alec closes the small distance between them, fingers closing gently around Magnus’ jaw and turning his head to the side. His other hand rests lightly against Magnus’ chest, fingertips skimming over the base of his throat, not quite sure what to do.

It is blood. Unmistakably.

It has already starting to dry against the curve of Magnus’ jaw where it had dribbled from his ear.

“Oh. That,” Magnus breathes out, shoulders relaxing. “It’s okay. Just pushed myself a little too far.”

Alec only nods and swallows thickly, hand caressing over Magnus’ nape and the buzz-cut behind his ear, unable to react in any other way.

Head still moved slightly to the side, Magnus keeps watching Alec behind his heavy lids. Alec’s focus is still on the dark trail of blood but he can feel softness, the vulnerability and raw tenderness, in that weary gaze. It’s radiating a faint amazement, and while it cracks Alec’s heart every time a little more, it’s getting better.

Maybe some day, Alec’s devotion doesn’t stir any astonishment in him at all. Maybe some day he’ll internalize that Alec’s love isn’t transient.

Alec is still patiently waiting for that day.

“Don’t worry,” Magnus murmurs, hands sliding around Alec’s waist. “It’ll subside.”

Alec moves without a thought, pulling Magnus close by his neck. He can’t tell if he is the one offering the solace or accepting it, deciding that it doesn’t matter either way. He’s hungry for the comfort and Magnus’ presence is something that he’s craving incessantly, no matter the circumstances.

“What do we do now?” Alec asks. He feels mortifyingly out of himself as the dark coil of despair uncurls in his chest, ambivalence taking over.

It’s a momentary relapse, a weakness he should have uprooted since stepping into these bigger shoes he thought he could fill. How naïve of him to even think so. _This wasn’t how leaders behaved._

His fingers tighten behind Magnus’ lower back, crumbling the fancy jacket. Shame heats up his neck and cheeks so he buries his face behind Magnus’ bloodied ear, trying to swallow down his embarrassment.

Magnus only squeezes back tighter. He smells like magic: ozone with burnt edges, but underneath Alec finds the faintest scent of skin and bath salts.

“I don’t know,” Magnus says, quiet but confident. “I don’t know yet but we’ll figure it out.”

When they finally pull apart, there’s no pity or hesitation in Magnus’ eyes. “You are so strong, my love,” he continues, gentle yet intent. His hand skims over Alec’s collar and then down along the open zipper of his jacket. “It’s only humane not to be all the time.”

From anyone else, those words would have resulted only stiff shoulders and denying words from Alec. He didn’t like to fall apart and expose himself, not even in front of his closest family.

With Magnus everything feels different. Coming from him, those words felt more like encouragement than evaluation. It was almost scary, how perspective Magnus could be.

For now, at least, Alec feels a little less guilty for being unsure.

Magnus smiles, warm and slightly worn out, unveiling the lived years behind the ever-young face. “I love you,” he murmurs and leans in once more to give a dry peck on Alec’s lips.

Alec swallows. “Love you too.”

_Oh, you don’t even know._

Magnus reaches down for the fallen stele, offering it to Alec who slides it back into his pocket and pulls his jacket to cover it.

“You should message your sister,” Magnus suggests, eyeing both ends the endless, dusty road. “I’m sure she would want to know where you are.”

Alec worries his lower lip. “Shouldn’t we portal back? To the Institute I mean.”

Magnus makes a vague noise in his throat, then lifts his own hand for himself to inspect. Even Alec can detect the tremor there. “Honestly? I’m glad I had enough in me to take the ashes from your eyes.”

“I’m not sure if Izzy can get another warlock to portal us back before morning.”

“Tell her not to bother,” Magnus flicks his wrist in a discarding manner. “By tomorrow I’ll be as good as new. And we’ll have to make at least one stop before going back, anyway.”

Alec glances up at the merciless sun, eyes narrowed against the harsh light.

“So we walk?”

“We walk.”

 

* * *

 

**viii.**

They reach the city in only twenty minutes.

Twenty hot, withering minutes.

Magnus ditches his jacket quickly in the oppressing heat, smoothly tugging the first button of his high-collared silk-shirt open. And even though Alec gets rid of his own heavy leather jacket soon, too, the way his black t-shirt clings to his sweaty back seems way less graceful than the tempting drops of sweat that glisten on the side of Magnus’ throat.

Grossly enough, Alec wants to lick them away. He wants to press Magnus into one of those small, dusty corners and sink his teeth to the tender skin next to his Adam’s apple. He wants to swallow every low moan, every hushed plead, every quiet confession of love.

He wants to forget the reason they’re here for.

The vociferous, carefree atmosphere is almost surreal. The streets are crowded, loud and colorful, full of the thick taste of life. Alec feels very much out of his skin in middle of it all, heart too heavy to understand the language of every easily thrown smile.

The light afternoon breeze is warm, carrying the thick smell of cigarettes as well as many strong aromas from the street kitchens for the hungry people to follow. For all the friends, lovers, and families whose main goal for the night was to get their stomachs full with a good company.

Envy would probably sting like the sweat in his eyes, if only his mental capacity wasn’t already overfilled with worry and anxiety.

Alec feels powerless.

With Azazel he was more out of his depth than he had even realized.

He had been thinking too simply, focusing only on finding the demon and forgetting the fact that, even with his best soldiers, victory against such a cunning mind and that much controlled power was anything but self-evident.

The board had expanded dangerously. The indiscernible way the ground had shifted left Alec stumbling in the dust of it, slowly realizing just how unable he truly was to protect the people he loved. It was all going down too quickly. A blind ride, and _oh_ , how Alec dreaded what he would find in the end of it.

He needed time.

He needed leverage.

A steady ground – even for a moment – so that he could regain his balance again.

Frustratingly enough, in this game, he was nothing but a pawn. Profitable only if placed right.

One pawn couldn’t protect everyone, no matter how desperately Alec wished so. He feared for Izzy. He feared for Max, for Jace, for his parents – he feared for Clary and that annoying vampire friend of his.

And Magnus…

For some unexplainable reason Alec had been unwilling to add Magnus to that list.

He had feared for Magnus’ life before, yet he had still been clutching to this fragile, desperate belief that he was untouchable. That he could handle himself. That as long as he was inside of the protecting wards of his apartment, no-one could get to him.

That the dark magic in his veins could protect him from something as crude – yet so natural – as death.

But Magnus wasn’t out of reach. None of them was.

The realization is hitting Alec hard.

They didn’t have the ascendancy, they never had. Behind his routines and precisely filled reports, he had somehow managed to ignore the reality of their situation.

They didn’t find Azazel – Azazel found them. He appeared exactly when it fit him best, lounging on Magnus’ plush armchair like a king on his throne, swirling his liquor as if he didn't have a thing to worry about.

Someone bumps into them. Unsteady hands lean heavily on Magnus to keep the balance.

Alec yanks Magnus backwards. There’s no danger – not even an actual threat of it – but his body moves faster than his thoughts, heart pounding in the wake of it. The man laughs and apologizes loudly in Spanish, breath so saturated with alcohol that Alec can almost taste it.

Magnus smiles timidly and shakes his head while Alec tightens his hawk-like grip on his bicep. “ _Está bien_ ,” he keeps repeating. “ _No no, todo está bien, no te preocupes_.”

After the drunken Spaniard has stumbled off, Alec finds himself in the receiving end of Magnus’ worried stare.

It’s not something Alec wants to explain, so he shrugs it off and keeps his ground until Magnus’ exploring eyes turn away again. He wants to believe that he’s smooth with his evasion but knows that Magnus can read his tells easier than one of his spell books by now. It’s not _I believe you_ , it’s _not now_.

It’s Magnus giving in when Alec can’t.

And he truly can’t. Not now. Not here.

Their narrow escape had left a bitter taste on his tongue. Maybe that’s why he felt oddly threatened even in the colorful streets of Spain, clinging to Magnus like a lifeline. The thick crowd isn’t doing much to make him feel any less like a target.

And Magnus is exhausted, Alec knows. It’s not so evident from his outer appearance, but more from the way he moves and holds himself.

Alec recognizes the fumes instead of the usual vigorous flame.

And he hates it. Hates how heavy Magnus’ steps are. How he can hear the rasp in his lungs, craving a fraction more oxygen than he’s getting. Hates the trace of blood that stays, staining the underside of Magnus’ ear no matter how much Alec wiped it with his sleeve.

It’s all so fucked up.

Skin hot and humming with the activated runes, Alec keeps taking everything in.

Every sound, every movement, every flicker of light gets compartmentalized and analyzed. Magnus’ steady pulse under his thumb is a centralizing force in the middle of it all. A weightless anchor where his every sense stays centered no matter how far his gaze wanders.

Maybe it was stupid to feed the fear of attack so substantially. Among the very first thing he had done after getting on his feet was to draw a rune to prevent tracking. Magnus had carved some kind of complex symbol to his own skin, too, for the same purpose. Nobody should be able to find them.

Alec shakes off the word paranoia.

It wouldn’t be the first time the odds had turned against them, though.

At some point Magnus pulls him aside, fluently tugging him against the rough, sand-colored stone wall.

“Alec, _tenang_ ,” he murmurs while gently undoing Alec’s steely hold around his wrist, finger by finger. “Calm down.”

Glancing down, Alec swallows and forces his white-knuckled grip open. The blooming bruise around the bony part of Magnus’ wrist makes a foggy guilt to crawl up in his throat. He opens his mouth to apologize but Magnus leans closer, dark eyes intense but gentle as his lips brush against the corner of Alec’s mouth.

“It’s okay. Trust me, it’s okay.”

Alec breathes in the words as Magnus presses closer. Heat clings between them desperately until it has no space to exist anymore, forced to yield as Alec curls his sweaty hands around Magnus’ waist and pulls.

His shirt is damp, sticking to his back like a second skin where he’s pressed between Magnus and the wall. Yet it’s a small discomfort to pay for the soothing way Magnus is leaning against him, breath a little too heavy against Alec’s neck.

When he pulls away, Alec feels notably better. Calmer. He doesn’t want to know if it’s because of magic or simply Magnus’ presence.

“A little further,” Magnus says, elegant fingers intertwining once again with Alec’s bony, sweaty ones. There’s weariness coloring the thick syllables that roll off his tongue, something that indicates exhaustion deeper than the one in bones. Longer than a few poorly slept nights.

Alec fears that it’s going to be the only forecast before the collapse.

He takes a deep breath through his nose and nods.

“Let’s go, then,” he concedes and brushes their dry lips together for a brief kiss.

If the collapse comes – if it’s truly unavoidable – one thing he _can_ do is create time. Every day, every hour, _every_ fucking _minute_ he’ll be able to steal and scrap together.

As much time as it takes for Magnus to rebuild.

 

* * *

 

**ix.**

The room could be worse.

Sure, it’s small and tasteless; beige walls, beige carpeting, a _fucking beige comforter_ on top of the bed. Like a bland morning porridge.

Positive thing is that the mild stink of cigarette is definitely ignorable. Alec might have gotten used to Magnus’ feather-filled mattress lately but he hadn’t forgotten the years he spent on the stony bed of the Institute. He isn’t picky.

It might be cramped and stale but at least it’s clean.

Magnus doesn’t seem to agree with him, nose wrinkling quite adorably as he examines the room further.

“Hey, it's fine,” Alec smiles and drops his jacket on top of the ridiculously narrow king-size bed.

“Darling, no offence, but you should re-think your definition of the word _fine_.”

Alec grins, peeling off his damp t-shirt as he heads to the bathroom.

The knobs of the faucet are stiff, a good layer of rust forming next to the caulking. They open with a screech. A low groan emerges from the pipes below before the lukewarm water starts running. Okay, he might miss the luxuries of Magnus’ apartment more than he wants to admit.

He leans against the sink and closes his eyes, patiently waiting for the water to get colder.

Now that the low but constant adrenalin excretion in his bloodstream is finally decreasing, the fatigue is reciprocally starting to sink into his aching muscles. It’s an abrupt lurch to the south, leaving Alec with tingling fingertips and a treacherous throb behind his eyes.

Maybe he shouldn’t have activated so many runes at once.

If the situation required, he could push his body quite far before even edging the disintegration. He knows how to regulate his energy, how to use runes efficiently and survive days without rest or nutrition. When well prepared, he can do all that and even more.

That’s why the sharp weight below his stomach doesn’t only indicate the same anxious-edged fear, but also a failure. It shouldn’t be so easy to wear him down.

He tries to justify the insufficient feeling in his gut with Magnus’ presence. Not many of their missions could have been classified as ‘normal’ lately, but this one just stroke deeper than the others, lodging an invisible blade tightly between his ribs. And he _tries_ to think clearly. To act swiftly and surely. To behave like the Head of the Institute he is, calm and calculated.

But no matter how hard he tries, he just can’t distant himself from this.

It’s too personal.

The invisible blade between his rib-bones is just long enough to graze his heart, poisoning his blood with one fear-filled though at a time. And it isn’t healing. Of course it fucking isn’t: no wound heals without the piercing object being removed. Something that’s unlikely to happen any time soon. Not until the threat has uncurled its cold fingers around Magnus’ throat.

But if you can’t remove the knife, you’ll adapt.

You’ll get used to the pain. Learn to ignore it, to breathe around it.

Simple as that.

In theory, at least.

Jace always kept harping about how feelings made them weaker, and to a certain point, Alec agrees.

He believes that love empowers. That it amplifies strength and builds up courage, calms the storm and clears thoughts down to the most important essence of the situation. All that, yes, but only when the driving force was low enough.

Because if the scale tipped over, the weight of what would spill over wouldn’t be anywhere near bearable. No matter how strong you claimed to be.

So yes, maybe love was the reason for his dry mouth and thumping heart, but to hell with him if he was ever again going to choose numbness over it.

There were times, of course. Times like this when he speculated if it would be easier. If the choices he had to make would be a little less difficult. If the fights he engaged in would be any less wearisome without the weight of trepidation.

It’s an interesting thought. What would it feel like? To switch it off, unconnect from everything. Everyone. Like now, knuckles gripping at the cracked ceramic, he almost wishes that he could.

But. There’s always the famous _but_.

As if he could ever look at Izzy without the overwhelming pride swelling in his chest. Like he could look at Max’s or Jace’s happiness without the corner of his own lip twitching up. Or his mother without remembering that mistakes were allowed, but it was your responsible to fix and learn from them.

As if he could look Magnus and see nothing but the sun itself.

He was a luminous force, truly. An eye-catcher; grandiose and unique. A stellar glow, yet never stealing Alec’s light but rather giving him the inspiration and courage to shine on his own. With Magnus he felt security and contentment he thought he would never feel in his own skin. Like he could genuinely achieve something on his own.

Funnily enough, his presence made Alec feel a little cleaner in the cynical world they lived in. Or maybe, with Magnus, the dirt and blood under his fingernails simply didn’t matter.

Love was a strange thing, no doubt. Strange and beautiful and unpredictable.

And perilous. Not often, but every time was one too much.

Humans could tolerate surprisingly much, body and mind shielding themselves with various protective acts, stretching and bending and conforming but never breaking. Until they did.

Maybe Alec’s scale had been filling without his notice? No-one noticed the weight of one drop, but what about ten? Hundred? What if the burden of it had been coming slowly, insidiously? What if he had gotten accustomed to the weight on his shoulders, just like he now tries to get accustomed to the fear that’s gripping his chest.

Sighing, Alec opens his eyes and bends over the sink, giving up his hope for cold water. It feels good, nonetheless, to wash away the layers of dust and sweat from his neck and face.

If his scale was on the verge of tipping, fuck it. He didn’t want to know.

Magnus is moving around in the main room, steps soft and nearly soundless against the stained carpet. Alec is just reaching for the coarse terry towel when Magnus’ steps come to a halt and the bed creaks. A loud tearing noise follows.

Alec steps out of the bathroom, water dripping from his chin.

“What are you doing?”

Alec knows that he isn’t gifted with much imagination, but somehow he doubts that not many could figure out the reason why Magnus was ripping off the – admittedly hideous – wallpaper.

“I know it’s ugly, but is this really the right time to start decorating?”

Magnus throws a smile over his shoulder, piercing gaze lingering just a fraction too long on Alec’s bare chest. Alec can’t help but respond to the smile. Little things, perhaps, but looks like that from Magnus always left him with a spark in his veins; something pleasant and exhilarating. Even now. Even _here_.

“Just being sure,” Magnus replies, annoyingly vague, and continues to tear long slices off the wall.

“Being sure of what?” Alec frowns.

Magnus tosses two more slices of paper to the floor and curses softly under his breath. Only now Alec realizes that he is searching something, fingertips skimming deliberately over the worn out paint underneath.

“No. No, they couldn’t…” The pad of his finger keeps drawing a slow circle against the painted surface that peeks from underneath the paper.

“Couldn’t what?” Alec probes and moves closer.

Magnus doesn’t answer.

“Magnus…?”

“Hm,” Magnus retreats from the tattered wall before worry gets to twist the blade any further in Alec’s side. He hops gracefully down from the bed and strides to the other end of the small room.

“Is this north?” he asks, black nails already scratching at the seam of the opposite wall.

“I don’t know, maybe? And that matters because…?”

“The owner has changed. I need to make sure that the wards she made are still up.”

“Oh…” Alec answers dumbly. He bends to pick up the slices that Magnus strews on the floor.

How thoughtless of him. Magnus was in no condition to create any protection for neither of them now. A safe sleep wasn’t something that should be taken for granted, as simple as it might sound.

Then something occurs to him. “Wait, how did you get us in, then? I thought you knew the owner. Did you have money?”

Magnus stills for a second, as if he had to actually think about his answer. “Well. No.”

Alec waits patiently and catches the next slice Magnus throws over his shoulder from the air.

“Did you pay with something else, then?”

“I fear that skin changing isn’t much of a trend anymore.”

Alec rolls his eyes, crumpling the fragile piece of paper in his hand.

He hadn’t paid that much attention when they checked in. Magnus had been doing all the talking anyway, Spanish flowing sinfully well from his clever tongue. Alec had stayed on the background, only partially aware of the conversation between his boyfriend and the young and jittery male receptionist behind the service desk.

And – for Izzy’s horror – he had understood less than half from what he had heard. Languages had never been a strong suit of his. Neither verbal nor bodily.

“Then what?” he asks, curiosity overthrowing his inner need to sulk over the witty comment.

Magnus rips off another quite big piece before answering. “I promised to pay back later.”

Alec waits for some addition to the sentence. It doesn’t come.

“That’s it? And he believed you?”

Magnus turns around at that, lips pursed and eyes narrowing. If Alec didn’t know him so well, he would say that he looked insulted.

“Yes. Why wouldn’t he?”

Alec shrugs, mostly to himself because Magnus’ focus goes back to the wall again. “I don’t know,” he huffs, “I wouldn’t. How can he know that your intends aren’t just to screw him over–?”

Magnus turns around so sharply that Alec actually forgets how he meant to end his sentence. There’s something almost smug in the low gleam of his lover’s eyes, a teasing edge in the curl of his lips. With a smooth step he moves closer, agile and predatory, like a cat – no; like a sleek, black jaguar.

“Come on, Alexander,” his hands brush over his belt before they move to rest on his hips. His smile turns soft but the sharpness of his eyes remains. “Don’t tell me you have never charmed your way through life?”

Alec smirks.

Magnus is tall. Sometimes Alec even forgets how tall, exactly, until Magnus decides to remind him again. His lips brush over the tiny scar on Alec’s chin effortlessly. Just a little tilt of his head and he is be able to reach Alec’s lips. There would be no strain in the movement, no aching necks or stiff shoulders afterwards.

Alec is used to tower over others, so it’s addicting, _this_ , how seamlessly they fit together.

He clears his throat, tries to clear his head, too.

“Do you wanna hear the attempts or successes?” his voice is unintentionally rough, “I will talk about neither.”

Magnus holds it together for a whole two seconds before looking away, corner of his mouth twitching. The smile that follows is unarming, maybe because it’s so genuine.

Everything in Magnus was captivating, but for Alec especially this; the flash of white teeth and a few shallow laugh-lines appearing in the corners of his eyes. And somehow his two front teeth, a little bigger than the rest in line, made him look younger when he laughed. Adorable even.

Alec definitely adores the airless sound of it.

“Don’t be so harsh on yourself. Maybe you just haven’t found the right audience yet?” Magnus retorts, smile still securely placed on his lips. “You’re charming. Trust me, I know. That thing what you do with your face when you order people around, _oh_ –”

And _oh_ indeed, because the face that Magnus suddenly makes to elaborate his point is just fucking unfair; mouth going a little slack and eyes hooding for a blissful expression.

It leaves Alec with a hunger darker than Magnus’ eyes and no faith for something as eminent as God.

Maybe Alec was never meant to be able to resist.

“You don’t even know,” Magnus’ voice does one final libidinous dip before it evens out, expression clearing. “Older ladies probably can’t resist you. I couldn’t, for one.”

Alec runs his tongue over his teeth, mouth and lips dry. “Why do I find myself doubting you?” he asks under his breath, skin rising to goosenbumps when Magnus moves closer again and trails two of his fingers inside the delicate skin of Alec’s wrist. It’s a light touch. Warm. “Besides, you’re not an old lady.”

“But I’m old.”

Alec wants to argue, but leaves it. How can he voice something he doesn’t even truly understand? The only thing he knows is that he doesn’t see Magnus’ age in years. In experience, maybe, but time with an ageless being wasn’t the same it was with mortals.

“Your charm worked on me, for sure,” Magnus smiles, eyes downcast. He looks almost bashful now; both his gaze and fingertips following the blue vein on Alec’s inner arm.

Alec watches shamelessly while Magnus’ eyes are down, drinking in the sight of him. He was allowed to look, sure, but some manners about staring never left. And with an access like this to look freely, Alec might just never look away again.

The way Magnus’ neck is just slightly craned to the right, leaving his throat taut and skin stretched over the sharp collarbone on the left. The line of his clavicle goes on and on until it disappears under the shirt, top buttons open, showing only teasing glimpse of a chest.

Magnus definitely knew how to pick the right clothes, Alec gives him that.

The shirt is slightly too small, not enough to be distasteful, but enough for it to hug Magnus’ shoulders and chest just the right way. It keeps tightening over his biceps as he moves, setting perfectly to the sharp hips where it’s tucked into an equally tight pants.

And the way he had his sleeves skillfully rolled up to his elbows, so precise and elegant. It makes Alec want to produce Magnus into something less sharp. Wants to smudge him at the edges, wants to make him lose that unerring control and preferably those clothes too.

Alec might not know fashion but he knows how to appreciate what’s under it.

Magnus keeps moving his fingers languidly, circling the crook of Alec’s elbow before continuing to follow the distinct vein until it disappears deeper into the flesh.

“You shouldn’t underestimate yourself,” Magnus murmurs and skims his fingers across Alec’s shoulder and to the bare expanse of his chest. A palm settles over his heart, skin warm but rings cool against his sternum.

“I’m not,” he closes his hand around Magnus’ wrist to hold it there. He enjoys the touch, the proximity of it.

Alec isn’t sure when either of them moved closer, but Magnus’ arms sloped around his waist like this are always welcome. He pulls Magnus closer by shoulders, bodies pressed even tighter together, nose bumping gently against Magnus’ snake-earring.

When closing his eyes, Alec can feel Magnus burying his nose against the curve of his neck, breathing him in. An apprehensive thought about how he must smell, of sweat and dust, doesn’t flourish Alec’s brain long.

In a different time, it probably would have. In a different place.

Spain is a beautiful country, Alec admits.

He likes the warmth and the carefree atmosphere, yet he fears that he cannot undo the memory of this. That the exotic air is always going to be connected to this anxious feeling in his gut.

He wonders, if not for Azazel, would Magnus have ever brought him here?

After one of those days – or weeks in Alec’s case – that just never seemed to end.

If Magnus would have looked at him one night when he came back home, head tilted behind his martini glass. If he would have closed that slim spell-book he often liked to browse when stressed, create a portal behind Alec and, with a whispered assurance, push him through it.

Maybe.

Alec likes to think so, at least.

There’s something in the warm, humid air. Something calming in the faint smell of cigars, spices, and sea. He wants to see Magnus here, but without the underlying weariness on his face. Wants the weight gone from his own bones, too.

They would sleep and they would eat. In a different situation, that’s all they would be doing for the first few days.

They would try local foods and desserts, ones Alec would never have heard of before. Spiced meat and vegetables, quickly grilled or long stewed, Alec didn’t mind. Fruits, sweeter than any at home, ripe enough for the juice to burst and leave sticky fingers behind. They would walk around the city and randomly choose different boutiques to walk in. Go to the mountains and the small cafes at the village next to them. They would walk a whole day until the bridge of Alec’s nose would be burned, and then sleep the next one.

It’s a lovely mental image. Alec clings to it maybe a little too fiercely.

He would lay Magnus down on top of the sheets because the midday air would be too hot to do anything else. He would lie down next to him; maybe slowly lick the salt away from the dip of Magnus’ collarbone. Sex wouldn’t happen then, no. It would happen later. After the heat dropped and made way to the cooling evening air, the chill of it breaking the sweat from their skins.

When a warm body against your own felt more like a redemption than chastisement again.

“Alec,” Magnus murmurs quietly, gently pulling Alec from the comforts of his imaginations.

“Hm?”

“I hate cotton sheets.”

Heart suddenly heavy, Alec tries to smile. It doesn’t come easily.

“Hate is a strong word,” he says vaguely.

“I don’t think you heard me, Alexander. They’re cotton. And beige.”

Truthfully? After seeing so much red, mainly on his own hands, Alec wouldn’t mind some beige in his life right now. A month of grey and ordinary life with Magnus? God, yes, sign him the fuck in.

“It’s not so bad,” he says.

Magnus sighs, lashes tickling against Alec’s cheek as he blinks. With a slow movement he straightens his neck and reaches for Alec’s lips, kissing him gently before pulling away.

“It’s a boring color,” Magnus replies softly, eyes and hands back on the ripped wall again. His fingers follow the faint lines underneath the paper, similar to the way they did with the map of Alec’s veins just a minute ago. It’s a complicated pattern there, shallowly carved in the painted stone, barely visible to the eye.

“I kinda miss boring,” Alec confesses, quietly, thinking about what he would give to get back to the time when his biggest problem was a small demon nest in the down town.

A lot, he decides. He would give up a lot.

Lost in thought, it takes a moment for Alec to detect the change in the atmosphere. A light shift in the air, so faint that he almost mistakes it for some of the redundant information that his activated runes were still trying to feed for his brains to process. It’s different now. He just fails to find source of the itch.

Something – _an intuition, perhaps?_ – induces his focus on Magnus again.

Magnus is breathing steadily, in and out, fingertips frozen against the wall. Alec narrows his eyes and keeps staring at his turned back, trying to figure if it’s tension that’s written in the curve of his spine or not.

“Magnus–”

“The wards are fine,” Magnus says over him. He turns sharply again, one hand moving to his hip and other playing with the silvery snake-earring. “We should be safe.”

Alec blinks, his mental footing gone.

“Good…”

There’s a smile on Magnus’ face but he doesn’t look at Alec. “Good,” he repeats.

Fiddling with the piece of ripped wallpaper, Alec very much feels like he’s missing out something.

“Is something bothering you?” he asks, somehow managing to sound less hesitant than he feels.

Magnus smiles, gaze still cast down on the dirty carpet. There’s something in his eyes that stops Alec. They look empty, almost eerily vacant, yet somehow still billowing with some carefully guarded, vacillate emotion.

The spell breaks quickly as Magnus shakes his head and sighs, looking at Alec again.

“No,” he says. “Just thinking what our next step should be from here.”

His eyes are clear, no sight of the shadows that seemed to edge his expression just a second ago.

So again the commendations go to Alec’s own precipitated imagination, then. Magnus was all right. Well, not all right, but as much as could be expected.

Crouching down, Alec begins to clean up the rest of the ripped paper.

He finds it surprisingly hard to assure himself.

 

* * *

 

**x.**

_Alec doesn’t think about him._

_Not until they meet again._

_He has become very successful at burying his feelings. Maybe that’s why he’s unprepared for the second time as he strides to the warlock’s hideout, jaw set and bow in a steady grip._

_For his defense, it’s not many times he has seen a warlock in action._

_Alec doesn’t want to admit that he’s momentary distracted by the smooth movement of the warlock’s spine; by the enchanting, sharp flow of his hands and the noiseless, cat-like steps against the carpet._

_Alec is pretty sure that the other warlocks he met didn’t look quite this captivating._

_Or dangerous._

_The Circle member fixes his hold on his Seraph blade._

_“Cat eyes,” he flashes his teeth, “a nice addition to my collection.” Alec doesn’t know how to deal with the sudden surge of anger in his veins, so he just draws his bow and shoots his seconds arrow for Magnus Bane._

_“Well done,” he finds himself saying afterwards._

_“More like medium rare.”_

_There’s a flicker of deep gold in the warlock’s eyes before they flash back to the dark brown. A trick of an eye, perhaps? There room is quite gloomy, after all. Still, trick or not, small thing like that shouldn’t send such a thrill down Alec’s spine._

_The warlock steps forward gracefully, seductive smile rising on his lips. “I don’t think we have been formally introduced. I’m Magnus.”_

_What Alec intends to say is ‘I’m Alec’ and ‘we should get back to the others’._

_What comes from his mouth is something else entirely, words sticking in his throat as he stutters out some half formed sentences. He would actually be ten times more embarrassed if he wasn’t so mesmerized by the man’s exotic beauty._

_The warlock thankfully decides to give him an easy way out._

_“Right,” he smiles. “We should join the party.”_

_Alec nods and escapes the room, heart thumping against his ribs in a way it hadn’t in a long time._

_He feels so incredibly good, light and addicted, until the terror catches up with him several minutes later._

_That’s how it starts._

 

* * *

 

**xi.**

Alec isn’t exactly sure what wakes him up.

He hears nothing apart from the constant low drone of the traffic that seeps through the thin walls. Things like that had never bothered him before.

The night is still slightly too humid, warm air clinging to his clammy skin. But it’s not that either. In fact, Alec rather enjoyed the exotic heat that kept dissolving away the deeply sunken cold that had been settled tight into his bones.

No, it’s more dreamlike and he’s rapidly losing the sense of it.

The harder he tries to reach the edge of it, the more equivocal and transparent the memory gets. It’s quickly slipping from his grip and fading into the still air of the room.

He manages to catch something of it, though. A handful of water from the retreating wave.

The flashes inside his eyelids are vacillate and fragile, ready to fade if he doesn’t grasp the meaning of them quickly and carefully enough. Alec barely dares to breathe, afraid that any movement at all could chase away that little wavering image.

A colour? Blue.

Very dark, deeper than the ocean. A low cobalt glow that goes on and on and on; further and further he had been following it in the darkness until his legs couldn’t carry him anymore. He remembers a silence that pressed heavily against his ears, silence that he couldn’t banish with his own voice.

He had been searching for something, desperately.

It’s the same dream again. The one he can’t even properly remember.

Alec exhales, figuring that he shouldn’t get up just yet. The dark blue stays, imprinted inside of his closed lids and begging for him to think harder, to remember, to figure it out.

Not knowing what to make of it, Alec chooses to ignore it. Losing sleep wouldn’t only be utterly pointless; it would be a tactical disadvantage. He needed to be on his top game now. He couldn’t afford anything else.

He lets himself sink to the edge of sleep again but something pulls him back again. Alec isn’t sure if it’s the disturbing feeling of his dream or just the lack of a warm body against his own.

He cracks his heavy eyes open again. There’s enough light filtrating through the cream-colored curtains for him to recognize Magnus’ still figure beside him. He is laying his back at Alec, sheets pulled up to his neck, so the only thing that stands out in the dim night is his dark hair against the pale pillows.

Alec considers about pulling him closer when he realizes it.

Magnus is too still. Too quiet.

It wasn’t that unusual, as whenever Magnus slept poorly he barely moved, waking up to the tiniest sound or movement. Just like he could sleep through several alerts and Alec’s morning routine without as much as stirring, limbs spread out on the bed, sheets tangled around his waist.

Both alternatives are familiar enough to Alec, and honestly speaking, he can’t say that he expected neither of them to sleep well after all the shit that has come down on them.

When he left to the Institute in the morning he truly didn’t expect to find himself in Spain, except maybe having a getaway-dinner with Magnus. Definitely not sleeping in a two star motel after fleeing a Greater Demon that wanted to make them keep a loose-worded deal, the same one that almost cost Magnus his life.

Not an ideal situation. Really fucking far from one actually.

But that wasn’t it.

Magnus’ exhales are too shallow. Alec recognizes the difference.

He isn’t sleeping at all.

Alec knew that Magnus had problems with sleep for a quite while now. From the way he always curled closer to Alec for warmth and closure, yet he never fell asleep before him. How he was always up long before Alec would wake up from his own cold nightmares, ones that he couldn’t remember in the morning but haunted him anyway.

Alec wants to ask. He wants to demand, to pull out the answers just like he wants to pull Magnus close and consume away all that subtle sorrow and desperation from his eyes. He wants to offer solidity. Safety.

He wants for his calloused hands to be able to provide all the love and healing Magnus deserved, but some days he doubts that all he’ll ever be able to create with them is destruction. He was taught to kill, not love; to use his words for politics, not for comfort.

He had been trying, though.

It remained mostly at the level of attempt because Magnus wasn’t very keenly accepting help. Or maybe he didn’t know how to receive it? Perhaps this is how it had always felt for Magnus – surrounded by people, yet so hopelessly alone.

A quiet noise reaches Alec’s ears, making the cold pressure rush into his bones, chilling his blood.

 _Please, please_ , for all the angels above, _not **this**_.

It feels like the whole world coming down on him, crushing his lungs and making it nearly impossible to breathe. The overwhelming weight suffocates him carefully, destroying him without a sound. There’s no thunder; the whole world isn’t shaking on its foundation, the atlas doesn’t twist and break.

Alec would’ve preferred it that way. He would’ve wanted gunshots and fire and sky cracking in half, because at least then he would have known that he wasn’t alone. He would’ve known that everyone else felt it, too.

But no, it’s only his world that’s breaking.

His world, wrapped in thin cotton sheets right next to him, achingly close, yet so horribly out of reach. Breaking down in such a quiet way that Alec is sure he can feel his bones creaking under the weight of this silent sorrow.

Magnus is crying.

Alec is sure of it.

It’s not a surprise, not really, given the way Magnus had been acting for the last few weeks. Alec had noticed. And he had asked. But Magnus had been stubborn so Alec had let him brush the matter under the rug even though he knew it wasn’t okay. None of this was okay.

Or maybe, deep down, Alec didn’t want to believe it. Didn’t want to admit that someone so constant and fierce could shatter like this.

Yet here they were.

It’s killing Alec, suddenly. The realization that the love of his life is laying less than a feet away from him, curled away and crying silent tears while thinking that Alec is fast asleep.

Thinking that Alec won’t notice.

Magnus’ shoulders aren’t even shaking. His breath isn’t hitching with wet, thick breaths. He is absolutely still, barely breathing at all. It makes Alec wonder how many this has happened before.

He almost doesn’t want to know. Just like he doesn’t want to know how Magnus’ had learned to cry so frightfully imperceptibly. Because this kind of silence wasn’t anything else than a due to a long practice.

“Magnus?” Alec whispers roughly as he rises up on one elbow. His voice sounds thick and faraway to his own ears.

Magnus tenses. It’s a subtle change – just a little movement of his shoulders– but not subtle enough to pass Alec’s notice.

When he turns to Alec, his face is dry. He has the same gentle smile on his make-up free face that he has been offering to Alec for weeks now. It’s soft and loving, yet not perfectly hiding the sadness underneath.

“Hey,” he murmurs and slips his hand over Alec’s ribs. He pulls himself smoothly closer, merging their bodies together. “Why are you awake?” he asks as he starts to mindlessly trace patterns across Alec’s bare skin.

“Could ask the same.”

Magnus huffs quietly. The smile doesn’t fall from his face.

It rarely does these days.

“Not really care about these European beds,” he says, eyes flickering down to Alec’s pecks, hand following to trace against the runes on Alec’s chest. He looks almost relieved to have a reason to break the eye-contact. “A bit too hard on my back, I think–”

Alec isn’t listening. The words are meaningless anyway. They’re there just to fill up the silence and smother down the suspicion.

No, instead he looks.

There’s something in Magnus’ face, something that catches his attention even in the dim light of the motel room. Something around his eyes, to be exact. It seems like a blur in Alec’s own bleary eyes, but blinking a few times doesn’t chase it away.

It’s almost like...

“Magnus,” Alec says quietly. Magnus blinks once before lifting his gaze up again, and yes – Alec knows how to detect the glamour by now. He shifts, trying to find a position where his chest wouldn’t hurt so much. He doesn’t.

He feels helpless. Weirdly and horribly powerless while laying there in the dim room, Magnus’ warm body only a breath width away. He doesn’t know how to fight this invisible enemy, has absolutely no idea how to protect Magnus from _this_.

He doesn’t give Magnus any head ups before touching his cheek.

Magnus reflexively begins to pull back but isn’t fast enough. Alec’s fingertips find the wetness under his eye, high on his cheek.

Magnus closes his eyes, Adam’s apple bobbing as he swallows. Alec is almost certain that he knows what he is thinking. Scolding himself for not being silent enough, for not making the tears disappear in the first place.

“Alec, I–”

“I’m not your enemy, Magnus,” Alec says abruptly, almost pleading. Because seeing Magnus like this is truly destroying him. It’s been eating him alive, carving him hollow for weeks. “I’m not going away. Please say that you know that.”

The forced smile is back again. Alec would loathe it if he could ever hate a single thing about the man in front of him.

“Thank you,” Magnus whispers. He means it, but it’s not enough.

Alec takes a deep breath in, trying to ignore the ache that’s spreading from his heavy heart to his restless fingertips. Because Magnus was still acting as if Alec’s quiet, pleading words were just for the sake of formality.

Alec has tried to make Magnus feel safe, to make it absolutely clear that he can open up to Alec about anything. He has tried not to push, but to quietly encourage instead.

But it’s been weeks, and Alec is lost. Drowning in his own desperation.

To be honest, he had thought that they’d been past this already. He had broken down Magnus’ stone walls before. Had held him when he crumbled, grounded him when he feared that the quiet night might finally get him for good.

He hadn’t expected to find another layer underneath. Dusty and little cracked perhaps, but still holding up strong. Alec doesn’t want to force them down, yet that is the only last option he sees in this dead end he finds himself in.

“What can I do?”

Magnus looks startled.

Leaning closer, Alec repeats. “What can I do? Please, tell me how to–”

“No,” Magnus interrupts, “Alec, no, don’t think that you should – that I…this is something I have to go through myself. I love you, but I can handle myself.”

The anger that sparks up from the remaining frustration scares Alec a bit.

“But you can’t,” he insists, low and heated.

Magnus dips his chin down, shoulders drawing up slightly. “I should,” he whispers back, a little defensive.

Alec tightens his hold on Magnus’ side, thumb pressing to the smooth skin just below his ribcage.

“No. No. You shouldn’t.”

Magnus’ eyes stay downcast, unblinking. His shiny mask is slowly failing him; expression impassive but eyes glistening with the emotions that are starting to bleed through.

“Please,” Alec rasps, inching even closer. He noses Magnus’ hairline first, then dips lower to brush his lips against the bridge of his nose.

Magnus sighs and lifts his face up enough for Alec to nuzzle better against his cheekbones. His breath is heavier now, but only slightly. There’s something bone-shaking there, in the way Magnus’ ribs expand under Alec’s palm and his throat clicks as he swallows.

“What do you want? Do you want to forget?” Alec whispers, the question fumbling out without a further thought.

The words make Magnus’ spine arch slightly. His head tilts up even more, enough for their mouths to almost align, lips close to Alec’s own.

A momentarily piece of mind. That’s all Alec is asking. An unhealthy oblivion perhaps, but he wants to give Magnus that. Needs to give him that.

Magnus’ eyes are open, dark and desperate in a way that Alec can’t identify.

Alec grunts and pushes forward, gently, open mouth catching Magnus’. He sorely accepts the fact that, despite how much Magnus looks like he knows exactly what he wants to say, the words will not come out.

He licks over Magnus’ upper lip first, tongue flat, then catches the plump lower lip between his teeth. Magnus makes a breathy noise in his throat, mouth opening even further, inviting. Alec grips Magnus’ side even harder and tilts his own head, sighing in satisfaction as he languidly licks into Magnus’ mouth.

It’s wet, a little messy and open-mouthed, slick tongues curling together, and Alec burns. He burns slowly, intensively. There’s a new kind of tightness coiling in his stomach now, warm this time, urging. It feels different here in the dark and humid hotel-room where the only familiar thing is Magnus.

It feels deeply intimate, almost like a secret. One that’s just for them.

Without breaking their unrefined kiss, Alec pushes Magnus gently on his back.

Magnus goes easily, body loose enough for Alec to guide him effortlessly. They shif a little clumsily, mouths still glued together. Alec manages to lazily nudge Magnus’ knees apart and lower his weight on top of him.

His grinds down, moans a little into Magnus’ mouth at the friction against his stiffening cock. There’s spit on Alec’s chin and his upper lip is becoming slightly raw and swollen; a pleasurable result of their sloppy kissing and scraping teeth.

It’s not okay, but it’s necessary.

A grounding, deep-seated satisfaction.

Alec is sure that he has never wanted anyone like this, _loved anyone like this_.

Magnus is breathing heavily under him, the edge of his kisses wearing off as his mouth becomes gradually slack. And he tastes warm, _so warm_ , and intoxicating.

Alec surges in only rougher, little dirty, all tongue and teeth. His hands squeeze at Magnus’ sides before they move down, on the hips, over the ass. He takes handfuls and squeezes, grip strong enough for Magnus’ lower body to raise an inch off the bed, grinding up against Alec.

It’s a beautiful sound, the one that Magnus’ makes against Alec’s open mouth. Damp and little uneven.

Alec trembles as Magnus’ eyes flutter shut and his head pushes back against the pillow, exposing his throat. The implication of it – of the line of his bared neck – seems somehow more prominent now. A sign of trust. It might be accidental. Maybe Magnus doesn’t even realize how much that little thing riles Alec up. Maybe he does.

This is how he wants to see Magnus always. This is how he deserves to feel, all the time.

Alec’s hands proceed from Magnus’ ass to his thighs, fingers digging into the firm underside of them. He is panting slightly, breathing heavily through his nose as he mouths over Magnus’ jaw. The need is exceptional, but he believes that the magnitude of it comes from a deeper feeling than just desire.

How else it could feel so good? So satisfying?

He licks over the sharp curve of Magnus’ jaw once more, then drags his open mouth wetly over his throat.

Magnus’ breathing picks up even more when Alec’s teeth scrape gently over his Adam’s apple. Alec notices, and sucks a bruise just beside it, enjoying the pressure of Magnus’ hips rolling up. It’s slow, teasing.

It feels good, not having to think.

Yet, in the back of his mind, Alec is painfully aware how selfish he is being.

He wants to help Magnus, yes, more than anything, but he’s also doing this for himself. If he was truly selfless, he would insist on talking. Like normal, well-functioning people.

But what is he doing? Trying to soothe his anxieties with sex and convincing himself that it’s what Magnus needs, too.

Licking over Magnus’ jugular, Alec tries to kill the deep-rooted guilt. He sincerely hopes that he’s just over-thinking his actions. Because deep down, in the very core of humanity, weren’t all people selfish? They help others only to smother down their own guilt or pity that the situation brings up.

So, empathy or self-preservation, in the end isn’t that all the same?

Alec sucks over Magnus’ collarbone slowly, dips his tongue in the hollow above it. Magnus’ chest is rising and falling heavily under him. The humid air of the room feels thick around them and the sweat is already slicking up Alec’s hands that dig into the hard muscles of Magnus’ thighs.

The room is still dim, so when Alec’s mouth finally disconnects from Magnus’ peck, he mostly just feels the line of spit that stretches from his lower lip to Magnus’ heaving chest.

Magnus wants this, Alec knows. He is just as hard as Alec is, hot and heavy, hips tense and moving in small circles. He has taken this passive role before, has given Alec free hands and let him do what he wants, but it doesn’t feel quite the same this time.

Alec swallows between his rough breaths as he absentmindedly grinds down. He doesn’t see a lot more than the dark outlines of Magnus’ features and the hand that’s splayed on the pillow. His chest tightens uncomfortably.

“Magnus,” he whispers roughly, “Magnus, please…”

Magnus opens his eyes. He does it probably for the tone of Alec’s words, as it’s probably not quite what he had expected. There’s a hue of gold glowing in the edges of his otherwise dark irises.

Alec wishes that he could activate his runes and see him better.

“Fuck,” he breathes out again, “Magnus–” He feels like he’s walking blind here, empty-handed and slightly frantic. He has no idea how to unravel his messy thoughts and rebuild them into words. Doesn’t know how to coax them out of Magnus, either. “Could you talk to me? Please…?”

It’s confusing, this mess of fervent desire and gnawing worry.

“I’m sorry,” Magnus says, eyes fixated somewhere on Alec’s throat. He lets out a shaky breath and tries again. “I’m sorry. I wish I could, but I don’t know – it’s harder to fix than before…” he trails off. “I wish I could.”

Alec has only vague ideas what Magnus means but he nods anyway. He brushes his knuckles over Magnus’ stomach, feels the muscles tense under his touch.

“Can I help?” he whispers.

_I want to help._

_I need to help._

Magnus looks like he’s beginning to sink back into the abyss of his thoughts again, eyes glassy and unfocused. Like he’s fervently searching for an answer. And finding none.

“I don’t know how,” he mumbles finally. There’s an inconsolable quality in his voice, one that sounds much like surrender. Alec absolutely hates it. As if a small part of Magnus was starting to believe that there was no way out.

The absurdness of the thought makes Alec only more drastic, determined and little wild.

He lowers himself on his elbows, hovering an inch above Magnus. Their clammy chests brush together as they breathe, the sound of their heavy exhales strangely obscure in the dark room. Alec has already drawn his lungs full – words unfinished but message clear in his mind – when Magnus’ eyes clear up.

The air escapes Alec with an unflattering rush.

Even in the shadows of the small hours, the intensity of Magnus’ gaze is unbalancing. Especially when unglamoured. Like this. Now. Alec would have thought that he’d already formed some kind of resistance to the golden hue and oval pupils by now, but the carnal hunger that stirs deep in his chest is apparently unavoidable.

It’s sad, how insecure Magnus still seems to be about his eyes. Alec loves them. They’re disarming. Unintentionally hedonic.

“I don’t want to lose you,” Magnus confesses suddenly. His quiet words are saturated with vulnerability, little breathless and so painfully genuine.

Alec is suddenly horribly aware of his heart, certain that he is able to count every quiet beat of it against his sternum. It feels too big for the small space in his chest, too raw and defenseless.

He hadn’t expected Magnus to truly fear that.

Magnus was careful, yes. Cautious even. He definitely didn’t consider their relationship as anything even near axiomatic. _But to this extend?_ Was he really so unsure about Alec?

Alec hums and leans down so that their foreheads are touching. He has to close his eyes, just to be able to form any clear thoughts.

“You need to stop thinking about me,” he says, slowly, careful to keep his voice gentle as otherwise his choice of words might sound a little harsh. “I’m not going away. I promise, Magnus. I’m not. I know it’s hard for you, but try, just try not to worry about how I’ll handle this. Please.”

Magnus’ breath is warm, tempting. Alec keeps his eyes closed; focusing on all the small tells he has learned from the man beneath him.

“I’m always thinking about you.”

It’s a smooth evasion. Sign number one.

Alec opens his eyes. “Of course you are,” he sighs and smiles. He knows it’s a sad one. He hopes that Magnus can’t tell it in the dark. “And you should. I’m irresistible.”

Magnus laughs quietly, a little burst of air. Next moment his neck is craning upwards so he can capture Alec’s lips.

“Look who’s becoming cocky,” he murmurs into the lazy kiss.

Alec answers by grinding down, stealing Magnus’ breath by pressing their mouths together. It’s even deeper this time, a sloppy curl of tongues. Magnus’ hands move from beside his head to Alec’s bare sides quickly, nails catching skin.

Alec knows that Magnus’ is being honest with him. He doesn’t doubt that. The thing is that Magnus doesn’t tell him everything. It’s unfairly hard to understand the whole picture when you only have a few pieces of the puzzle. Alec isn’t any closer to understanding the reason why Magnus’ reaction is this intense.

Magnus’ teeth catch Alec’s lower lip. It’s sharp enough for Alec to gasp and slightly jerk back in his surprise.

The little he sees, Magnus looks almost daring. Bold even. His eyes are wide, curious for Alec’s reaction. It looks like he’s waiting for Alec to bite back, to rough him up.

Alec is tempted, very tempted.

Wouldn’t that be a delightfully simple answer? Just fuck some sense into Magnus.

Alec dives in with re-ignited fire in his bones, mouth colliding with Magnus’ in almost bruising manner. He swipes his tongue in, curls it along Magnus’ and coaxes some tight, unsteady noises out of him. It’s fast becoming more heated and Alec’s skin buzzes, his pulse thrumming under his skin.

He desperately wants his briefs gone, wants to feel Magnus against him, all of him, but he isn’t going to ask Magnus to get rid of them. It’s unclear, even to himself, why his pride can’t take it now.

There’s a point he wants to prove to Magnus – _that he’s trustworthy, that it would be easier for both of them if he didn’t withhold this from Alec_ – but he doesn’t want the conviction to happen like this.

“Alec–” Magnus gasps, squirming where he’s pressed against the squeaky mattress.

Alec makes a noise in the back of his throat, a deep moan that’s meant to be some kind of an answer to a question he doesn’t even know. He is achingly hard, has been for a while now, and it’s starting to be a difficult task to focus on anything except the pleasure. His hips seem to have a mind on their own, grinding down with unsteady, rough thrusts.

Alec’s toes dig into the scrambled sheets.

Magnus’ heels dig into Alec’s lower back.

It’s good, except Alec’s briefs are becoming uncomfortably tight in all the wrong places. When he finally struggles up to get rid of them, Magnus beats him to it, thumbs already dipping into the elastic waistband and tugging them over his ass. His touch is intense. Irrefutable.

All Alec really wants is Magnus to get better.

And fuck him.

Steady and precise fingers close around Alec’s cock, coaxing an undignified sound from somewhere deep in his chest. He doesn’t even try to swallow it back. Magnus has already seen everything and Alec doesn’t have any kind of patience to hold back anymore.

So he drops his head on Magnus’ shoulder and pants his lust against the olive-scented skin. His knees are sliding a little against the cheap sheets, nudging Magnus’ legs even more apart as he thrusts irregularly and little desperately into Magnus’ hand.

Blood is rushing in his ears and Magnus’ low words are nearly drowning under the sounds of Alec’s own desire. It’s Spanish at first, he notices, but some Indonesian words are quickly starting to bleed in, too.

Alec breathes louder, eyes rolling back and hips bucking as he chases his pleasure. He loves to hear Magnus talk in bed, loves the sound of his voice and the effect it has on him. It doesn’t always need to be anything meaningful. No, the cheap and unimportant words aren’t unwanted at all, especially if they’re in different languages.

And Magnus knows this, too. Knows how to get Alec high and keep him burning.

Or maybe it’s just his presence, as Alec is unquestionably sure that he’ll always want Magnus, anywhere, anytime.

Magnus’ thumb slides over the head of Alec’s cock, making it jerk in his hand as he spreads the transparent precome there. His grip is dry, but it’s also warm and _oh_ , so skillful. He’s moving his wrist in a way that Alec can’t fully comprehend, stroking steadily and squeezing at just the right places to build up the heavy heat in Alec’s abdomen.

“ _Me encanta verte así,_ ” Magnus keeps breathing against the shell of Alec’s ear, “ _Ni siquiera sabes_ …”

He isn’t at his peak yet, but it’s still incredibly frustrating when Magnus’ uncurls his grip from his pulsing cock. He huffs out a breath, thrusting once more, this time against Magnus’ own boxer-clad erection. It’s incredibly satisfying that Magnus can’t keep himself from bucking up.

It makes Alec grin, briefly, before he sinks his teeth into the juncture between Magnus’ shoulder and neck. The sharp inhale that he gets for a reward is exactly what he hoped.

“ _Naik_ ,” Magnus whispers suddenly.

It’s an order Alec knows, although it takes him a while to get his head around the word, never alone act through it.

_Up._

Even when knowing the meaning of the word, it might actually be Magnus’ tone more than anything that makes Alec move.

Usually, during sex, it was Alec who liked to take the control. He was eager, he didn’t mind admitting that. With Magnus spread on silken sheets, who the hell wouldn’t be? So yes, Alec knows that his _‘control’_ is mostly physical, that it’s strongly based on his youthful passion and excitement. He burns with the need to give pleasure, wants to see and hear the things he can do to Magnus.

But sometimes, whenever Magnus decided to regain some of that control, it wasn’t anything like Alec’s.

With him, it was like living through the nature’s own force. He was gravity. Everything bent towards him, and all that didn’t dip into the intriguing void of his existence, simply didn’t belong to this reality for the moment.

So Alec sits up on his heels. He finds an unexpected calmness in obeying.

Magnus follows, rising up on his elbows and catching Alec’s lips in a lingering kiss. It’s slow, wonderfully so. Alec goes gently for it until the deep hunger twists his stomach and urges him to get more. He tries to roughen it up, to sweep his tongue in or bite, but Magnus’ head twist softly away the moment he tries.

There’s not enough light to be sure, but Alec thinks that he sees wonder in Magnus’ glamourless eyes. Just briefly, until they narrow in determination.

Magnus slides gracefully away from beneath Alec. Then, with warm hands and intent eyes, guides Alec down on the bed again. On his back this time. He doesn’t say anything, but somehow it’s only strengthening his ascendancy.

Alec wills himself to relax and lean back to the crumbled pillows. Magnus’ hands are warm and grounding on his thighs, but it’s not enough to calm down the burning need that throbs just under his skin, same rapid beat as his pulse.

Magnus moves like water. The small, fluid rolls of his shoulders are weirdly captivating, hands sliding higher and higher on Alec’s thighs. Up, up, _up_ , until his thumb is circling the base of Alec’s cock and his fingers close around it.

Alec screws his eyes shut and groans, head pushing back to the pillows. He’s quick to open his eyes again, though, when then touch gets svelte again. Magnus is looking him through the dimness, head cocked and breath loud enough for Alec to hear.

He keeps the eye-contact to the very second until his head dips down.

The first, flat lick of tongue has Alec’s eyes rolling back. By the time Magnus’ lips close around the head of his cock, Alec is squeezing the sheets hard enough to actually rip them. He almost is sure that he hears a slight tearing sound from the seams before he moves his hands to Magnus’ hair, nails digging into the sensitive scalp.

He is careful not to thrust into the warm mouth. Magnus is slowly working him deeper, wet throat constricting around Alec’s cock in a way that leaves him breathless. He is gradual, pulling Alec apart piece by piece.

Alec doesn’t mind abandoning himself to it, hardly capable for any deeper brain-functioning anymore. His hands travel unsteadily from Magnus’ hair to the back of his head, fingertips dazedly following their way to the sharp curve of Magnus’ jaw, to the dip of his larynx.

It’s thrilling, to feel Magnus’ throat work under his hand. The thin skin there feels vulnerable, soft.

When Magnus swallows around him, Alec can’t control his body anymore. His hips thrust up rather roughly, yet Magnus barely coughs, just takes him deeper. Alec can only groan through the tide of pleasure, let it pull him down and away.

It was scary how much he would do for this man.

It was even scarier how little he could.

 

* * *

 

**xii.**

_Alec knew how to act in fight._

_He knew how to read those who were going to attack him. How to interpret their movements, predict their thoughts. He could hear it from their breathing and see it from their eyes, what they were going to do._

_This, however, was a completely new battlefield._

_He isn't sure how to read the arch of Magnus’ body. He doesn’t know what to deduce from the hitch of his breath, from the flutter of his eyes, and he sure as fuck isn’t certain how to answer to it all. It’s a language he is desperate to learn._

_He feels clumsy and uncertain, yet ablaze, swimming in deep waters with no bottom to place his feet on._

_For the first time, it doesn’t feel wrong._

 

* * *

 

**xiii.**

The sun is already warming up the room, cutting through both the thick curtains and Alec’s closed lids.

It’s late. He knows that even without opening his eyes.

He is almost disappointed that he’s denied the usual blissful seconds where he barely remembers who he is. He isn’t exactly a light sleeper, so the wakefulness usually comes more gradually than this.

It’s definitely freeing, in a way, to simply exist.

Even if just for a moment.

Now he remembers immediately. He remembers even before he recognizes the warm weight of Magnus’ body glued to his side, face pressed against the crook of Alec’s neck. Alec relishes the steady breath against his throat before carefully twisting his arm enough to reach his phone on the bed-side table.

Almost 11 a.m. Not far from what he would’ve guessed.

He wants to scold himself for sleeping so long, although he doesn’t know what he could possibly have accomplished alone in their motel room while Magnus slept. He certainly wouldn’t have waken him up, that’s for sure. Magnus needed to regain his energy.

And maybe the rest wasn’t bad for Alec, either. It didn’t erase their problems or make Alec feel any less jittery about it, but at least he could focus better now.

So despite the near overwhelming waves of nervous energy that roll back against his shoulders, he draws it out. He turns to his side, carefully, and skims his hands over Magnus’ bare side.

Magnus burrows his face deeper under Alec’s jaw and throws his leg over Alec’s hip. The blanket is gone, one corner of it tangled around their ankles, but otherwise on the floor.

Alec swallows, throat clicking. His fingers feel clumsy as he brushes them against Magnus’ buzz-cut, then trails gently against the base of his skull. Last night feels distant and dreamlike. Both the encounter with Azazel and the messy midnight sex that main purpose was to avoid talking.

Magnus twists away at one point, rolling on to his stomach and exposing the curve of his back to the balmy air. Half of his face stays buried in the pillow and Alec’s arm under his neck. He looks much softer like this, although not quite as peaceful as Alec had hoped.

He sleeps longer than Alec at least, something he hasn’t done in weeks.

Alec counts that as a victory, if a small kind. It isn’t relief what he feels, not exactly, but something eases in his chest at the sight of Magnus finally resting. Maybe last night had finally drained him to the breaking point?

Magnus stirs about half an hour later, blinking at Alec, bleary and unfocused. Before that he turns and twists a good while, kicking Alec on the knee and tugging the one corner of the sheet from under the lumpy mattress.

Alec stretches it even after that, occasionally placing a soft kiss against Magnus’ cheekbone, temple, forehead. Magnus nuzzles back lazily, toes curling against Alec’s calves, knuckles brushing against Alec’s stomach.

In a morning like this he looks unfairly adorable, not that Alec would ever say it to him – he knew the answer he would receive if he did. _I’m the High Warlock, Alexander. I have a reputation to keep._ Alec couldn’t blame him for those imaginary words since he was rarely any better.

But now, even this soft and warm, shifting closer while his dry lips search for Alec’s throat, he only made Alec’s chest tighter. The moment was so different from the nightly one, yet the same fundamental exposure remained.

They had both regained some kind of emotional equilibrium during the small hours. That’s probably it. There was vulnerability in Magnus’ weary gaze, only without the jittery despair clawing at his skin. Now, more than anything else, it’s cautious. Magnus blinks slowly, wariness written in his dark pupils and the corner of his mouth.

Alec kisses him on the lips, trying not to show the uneasiness that’s building steadily in his bones. He is terrified how all this will end.

He isn’t ready to renounce this love he had fought so hard to have and keep in the first place.

_He won’t._

He’ll fight dirty. Cheat, if necessary. He’ll lie and misguide and deceit for this. For Magnus.

Azazel might be stronger and more cunning but he didn’t have Alec’s motivation. He wasn’t desperate, not like Alec. He wasn’t intent to win with any way necessary.

Or so Alec hoped.

The only weapon he possessed was his obsessive drive to save Magnus and it needed to be enough.

When they finally drag themselves up from the coarse sheets, it’s well past midday already. They eat outside, on the small terrace, half under the shade of the next building. Their breakfast is roughly built from spiced bread, yoghurt, grapes, two overripe mangoes, and coffee.

Alec doesn’t really care for the bread, but he savors the bitter taste of the unusually strong coffee on his tongue. It isn’t quite as enjoyable in the hot weather of Spain where the sweat covers his neck before his mind even strays to the much needed caffeine.

Yet there’s something affable there, in the cramped space of the terrace where his knees scrape against the rusted white table.

Magnus drinks his own creamy coffee with deliberate sips and shreds his bread into tiny pieces before eating them. His skin seems to almost shine against the pale tincture of the calcium walls, the bright sun giving him a beautiful, coppery shade.

They eat mostly in silence, only discussing briefly about how to proceed with Azazel – something that doesn’t coax more than a few short sentences from each of them. Alec doesn’t actually have a clue what to do next, certain that there’s no Clave protocol he could apply to the situation in hand. And if Magnus has an idea, he doesn’t share it.

The near obmutescence isn’t necessarily awkward, but Alec is absolutely sure that he’s not alone feeling the weight of it. The nightly scrapes of their conversation were exposing enough that they couldn’t pass unnoticed, but in the light of day it felt almost too bold to even think about reopening the matter.

The wound feels inflamed, the stitches holding it together sore.

And Magnus keeps stalling. His fingers trace the white cup every time before he drinks.

It’s not much. More obvious is the way he tries to relax his shoulders, the tension in his throat giving him away. He doesn’t look at Alec long periods at once, lowering his gaze after two or three seconds of eye-contact.

His uncertain behavior causes anxiety to crawl up in Alec’s throat, a feeling that he tries to flush down with his steaming black coffee. It burns his mouth, yet he doesn’t flinch.

He’s letting this go, but only for now.

They freshen up quickly after the breakfast. Magnus is the first one to occupy the bathroom, quickly spending almost forty minutes of their precious time. The mild frustration Alec might have felt vanishes quickly after he climbs out of the uncomfortably small shower himself, thankful and somewhat relieved to find a bow and quiver lying neatly on the unmade bed.

It’s not the one he usually uses, but it’s still far better than nothing.

Their next stop is one of Ragnor’s old apartments. Magnus doesn’t exactly know what they’re looking for, just assures that he’ll know when he finds it.

It’s a literature. That much Alec gathers from Magnus’ vague explanation. Something to help with Azazel.

Magnus pays their night and portals them to France. Northern France, to be exact; a huge villa at the countryside. Quiet enough for Alec to feel slightly nervous by the sudden lack of life. At first he had been threatened by the frantic streets of Spain, but in retrospect it had offered quite encompassing cover.

“Can I help?” Alec asks about for the fourth time. “Mag _nus_ ,” he drags the name, accent becoming unintentionally thicker. “Anything.”

“Trust me, I wouldn’t enjoy anything more than your help,” Magnus says without raising his head from the book, “I want to leave this place as fast as possible, too.”

Alec leans back against the wall, fingers drumming an uneven rhythm against it.

The room they had immediately headed into smells like dust and is seemingly dedicated to written treasures only. The books and journals fill it to a ridiculous extend.

Alec notices that the first volumes are neatly placed in the carved, wooden bookshelves – even the next ones are carefully piled on the table and chairs – but as they had began to accumulate the previous owner had obviously just tossed them wherever there was enough room. The most recent purchases were simply scattered on top of the numerous piles of dusty books and notes.

Yet it seemed like chaos well organized. Sign of a well sophisticated and contemplative mind.

Two of the four walls have large windows to the old and uncontrollably rampant garden. The sumptuous divan is placed close to the windows, allowing the person to read in natural light as much as possible – a much more pleasant option to the antiqued lamp in the corner.

Alec rubs his thumb against the handle of his bow, giving every detail of the room unnecessarily much attention. He contemplates about going to explore the house but decides against it. Even if he hadn’t known Ragnor while he had lived, it felt just too offending towards Magnus to go and snoop around his beloved friend’s house.

But he couldn’t stay still, either.

“There must be something I can do. Just describe what you’re looking for and maybe I can–”

“Do you know old Arabic?” Magnus interrupts him softly.

Alec raises his eyebrows. “Do you?”

Magnus looks up enough to reveal the smug glimmer playing in the corner of his eyes. “I know enough,” he shrugs, focus already back on the book in his lap.

He has one pile on each side of his hips. The left one was to go through; the right one was already browsed. His fingers trail against the fragile pages absentmindedly, following the rows along with his eyes. He stops occasionally; thumb twitching against the cover of the book before subtly leaning closer, the dormant fire in his eyes flaring up.

Every single time Alec stiffens, too, waiting for Magnus to confirm some new discovery.

Every single time it ends to the light dying in Magnus’ eyes; following his shoulders slouching and fingers skimming multiple pages forward, frustrated.

That goes on for several hours.

Time crawls unbearably slowly for Alec.

He calls Izzy, asks about the situation in the Institute. She assures him that there’s nothing unusual, not even a rumor of an attack. The wards were just recently strengthened, and Alec trusts both Magnus’ work and opinion, but this inaction continued to build his mental distress incessantly.

After two phone calls he starts to text her about the reports, giving her generous instructions how to keep the Institute running and maintain the high alert. After his 27th message Izzy snaps at him to calm the fuck down ( _which is, excuse him, very rude – was this the thanks for his help?_ ), so he has to put down his phone.

As Izzy stops offering him a proper distraction, he starts to take away the books Magnus has already skimmed through. He also subtly sneaks in some volumes he thinks contains the language they’re searching for. Most of them Magnus doesn’t even open, but he doesn’t ask Alec to stop either.

Alec is thankful for that. He really can’t stand the idleness.

It’s beginning to grow dark again when Magnus closes his last book with a sigh.

Something dark curls in Alec’s stomach. Despite persistently telling himself not to, he had still been unconsciously clutched into this fragile glint of hope.

“Are you sure that what you’re looking for is really here?” Alec asks and takes the book from Magnus’ limp hand. Magnus brings his free hands immediately to his temples, massaging them with slow circles.

“If it’s not here, it’s not anywhere,” he mumbles. “Not anywhere I could find it, at least.”

Alec sits down next to Magnus on the plush divan. “What did you even hope to find?” he presumes quietly.

Magnus leans back, head lolling back against the pillows.

“Hope,” he exhales, almost absentmindedly. The quiet noise he lets out next is something between sob and snort, a soft voice that reflects the defeat in his eyes awfully well. It’s making Alec’s chest ache. “I was hoping to find hope.”

Alec studies him carefully.

He tries to keep up, he truly does, but he still rarely finds himself on the same line as Magnus. He isn’t jealous, no; mostly he’s just glad and incessantly proud that the man he chose is so frighteningly smart.

Magnus’ thoughts were often too complex for him to follow, as he was always thinking ahead, sideways, fucking upside down, continuously preparing for the next move. Invariably that one, critical step ahead of everyone else. The picture he sees is so much wider than Alec's.

Now, though – more than anything else – he looks lost.

That scares Alec more than he wants to admit.

“I was so sure that I would find it,” Magnus murmurs against his own knuckles. “Or, at least like 55% sure. Ragnor used to talk about it.”

“About what?” Alec prompts quietly.

“Somewhere around 1940’ he won information about some Greater Demons. By playing poker, can you believe that? _A fucking card game_ ,” Magnus snorts again, humorless. “Anyway, he won information about their past and current allies, strengths and weaknesses, things like that. Or so he told me. I know that it was a bit of a long shot to assume that one of those demons would be Azazel, but it doesn’t matter if I can’t even find the damn notes.”

“Notes?” Alec echoes. “If he won the information, he would have written it down by himself, right?” he sits up better, trying not to sound too enthusiastic, “–shouldn’t we look from Ragnor’s own journals, then?”

Magnus looks almost apologetic. “I wish it was that simple. The old bastard was smarter than that.”

“What do you mean? Shouldn’t we at least check ‘em?”

Magnus shakes his head. “He never left his writings on any place visible. You’ll find that those journals and ‘self-written’ papers contain only some scarps from the books. His own writings he hid somewhere between the covers he believed no one would ever open.”

Alec curses under his breath, but admits that to be clever. He strokes Magnus’ thigh soothingly a couple of times, back and forth, then palms his kneecap.

“Why didn’t he share it with you?” he asks, careful with his tone. “I understood that you two were close.”

Magnus doesn’t wince, but the corner of his eye twitches at Alec’s words. He stays still, hiding any further reactions under his steady appearance. He clears his throat before speaking.

“I’m not sure, actually. There was something he didn’t want me to see, I guess. I know because he downplayed it pretty soon, before I even started asking, really. He depreciated it well but that only made me more certain that there was something. I think that it might have involved my…heritage.”

Alec can tell that it isn’t the word he originally intended to end his sentence with, but he doesn’t confront Magnus about it. Not now when he looked so defeated already.

Besides, there’s something else that’s tugging Alec’s splayed thoughts, demanding his attention. Something he has forgotten, an uneasy feeling that doesn’t sit well with their current scenario. He isn’t sure what he feels and why exactly he feels so, but he knows that he isn’t that far away from an answer.

“It’s okay,” he whispers, forcing conviction into his voice. “We’ll just do without it. It’s not like it’s impossible.”

 _–right?_ he wants to add.

Magnus doesn’t answer, eyes fixated on the plush rug under his feet.

“Maybe I should check once more, just in case,” he murmurs and stands up. He plucks up few volumes from the pile on the floor. “Ragnor’s knowledge could truly have helped us with Azazel. My knowledge is, hm...focused on somewhere else.”

Alec doesn’t hear the dip at the end of Magnus’ sentence, his brain suddenly kicking into high gear. He has heard that sentence before – exactly the same sentence – and not even that long ago.

_I truly think that my knowledge about greater demons could help us with Azazel._

A few books slide from the couch and hit the floor as Alec abruptly stands up, startling Magnus.

“Alec–”

“This isn’t the only way,” Alec breathes out as he pries the book from Magnus’ hands, “Ragnor couldn’t be the only one to know these things – _he isn’t_.”

“Alexander, this isn’t something we can just dig up from library–”

“I know! I know, I know,” Alec says, words coming out fast and thick. He is almost reluctant to believe that their solution could be this simple, even though most of the hardest problems often had the most uncomplicated answers.

“This is different. It’s Sebastian. He offered it to me himself. Said that he has worked with the Greater Demons before, that he knows how to deal with them. Azazel specifically. ”

Magnus freezes, swift fingers closing around Alec’s left wrist. Alec swallows back his growing vivacity, enthusiasm dying quickly under Magnus’ frighteningly still demeanor.

“Alec,” Magnus says, very quiet, as if afraid someone could hear them. It makes Alec’s skin crawl, neck tingling with nonexistent gaze on his back. For all he knew, they were still alone. “That isn’t a common knowledge,” Magnus continues, “Even I don’t know Azazel’s pressure points. And I’m sure that the Institute’s database contains even less.”

Alec blinks fast. The sudden ardor of his realization is completely gone by now, a cold hunch compensating the loss of the fiery feeling.

There was nothing simple about this anymore.

“How does he know, then?”

 

* * *

 

**xiv.**

_“Can I ask you something?” Alec says, carefully._

_He has been thinking this a lot. The only thing that has been holding him back was the total distrust in his own communication skills with such a sensitive matter. He didn’t want Magnus to clamp down._

_Magnus smiles at Alec over his dish, the corner of his eye twitching. He knows that something is bothering Alec. He always knows._

_“Yeah, sure.”_

_He swirls his fork smoothly in the creamy spaghetti._

_Pasta Carbonara. Not from a restaurant, but by Alec this time. Simple enough to prepare. Magnus looks like he’s enjoying it, has said so a couple of times, too, not frugal at all with his compliments._

_Still Alec keeps watching. Examines how much Magnus eats and how quickly. How often he stops to take a sip from his wine-glass. Is it often enough to be because he’s rinsing out the taste?_

_Unnecessarily, Alec knows. Yet he can’t stop. Some things still make him feel overly uncertain._

_What he’s about to ask now isn’t related to his culinary skills, though._

_“Alec?” Magnus says his name softly and sets down the cutlery. The concern is growing quickly in his eyes._

_Alec bites inside his cheek. “Why did you almost do it?”_

_Magnus stays absolutely still, expression giving out nothing.”You gotta be a little more elaborative here, Alexander,” he says, just an inch too sharp. “I do a quite lot of things.”_

_Alec takes a giant chug of his own wine and swallows it down. He doesn’t choke on it but it’s a near thing._

_He isn’t sure how to continue now._

_“In London,” he starts, fingers playing with the grip of his glass. He’s vaguely aware that with a little more pressure he could break the thin handle. It feels too fragile to support his intentions. “In the bridge. All those years ago…” He stops there and glances up, hoping that he doesn’t have to say more._

_He doesn’t want to say it aloud, feeling horrifyingly powerless against the word._

_Suicide._

_Magnus leans back but doesn’t say anything. He doesn’t look angry, but he doesn’t look exactly upset either. Alec can’t tell what he’s thinking, but he recognizes the mask._

_Alec looks down again, fumbling for the right words. Magnus understands what he means, he’s sure of it. The silence indicates that he’s waiting for Alec to continue._

_“You almost did it.”_ You almost jumped. _“Why?”_

_Alec knows the intensity of it. He remembers how it felt to stand on the edge even though it’s mostly just a dreamlike memory in the back of his thoughts; a bad dream that shakes you enough to stay for years. And even though he knows that he was under the spell at the moment, he doesn’t want to reflect any further the reasons why his reaction to it was so extreme._

_“So…” Magnus says, seemingly regained his composure by now, “Simon told you?”_

_“He’s got a mouth, you should know that.”_

_“Yeah,” Magnus sighs and takes another sip of his wine, shoulders relaxing. “I’ll keep that in mind next time I try to encourage him.”_

_The hard-edged tension is starting to melt away, allowing Alec to breathe a little easier. The hardest part was over. Or so he hopes._

_“So it’s true?” he pursues, well aware that Magnus hasn’t given him any proper answer yet._

_Magnus stays quiet for a while, teeth coming to worry his bottom lip. He doesn’t look at Alec, but rather at the half-eaten dish in front of him._

_Alec fidgets with his sleeve. Maybe this wasn’t so good idea after all?_

_“I didn’t mean to make you uncomfortable. You don’t have to talk about it if you don’t want to. I’m sorry.”_

_Magnus slumps slightly in his chair. “No,” he shakes his head, “No, that is my line, not yours.”_

_Alec leans forward, crumpling the napkin on the table. He didn’t mean to cause this. “No, you don’t have to apologize. If anyone should apologize, it’s me. I didn’t mean to push you like this, it’s obviously a sensitive matter to you–”_

_“Alexander.”_

_Alec shuts up._

_Magnus’ eyes are gentle when he looks at him. Alec waits for him to continue, but instead he stands up and walks around the small table to Alec._

_“This is not on you, not at all,” he murmurs as he leans down to catch Alec’s lips._

_Alec isn’t quite sure what’s happening anymore, but he goes with it. He had imagined so many worse outcomes to his question, and none of them included kissing._

_When Magnus straightens his back again, there’s harshness in the edge of his gentle gaze. It’s not towards Alec, though. The soft part is._

_Alec spreads his knees further to let Magnus stand between them. Magnus comes without asking and palms Alec’s cheek._

_Something hard unfurls in Alec’s chest. He curls his hands around Magnus’ hips and leans against the backrest so he can look up without craning his neck._

_“I’m sorry,” Magnus worries inside his cheek. “That wasn’t very appropriate reaction to your question.”_

_Alec can see how hard Magnus is pushing himself. He’s clearly out of his comfort-zone._

_It’s both bothering and relieving. Alec doesn’t want to make Magnus uncomfortable, but he’s also beyond pleased that he’s trustworthy enough for Magnus to be vulnerable around him._

_Magnus licks his lips. His fingers are surprisingly cold against Alec’s cheek._

_“You are allowed to ask,” Magnus continues. “Always. It would be quite sanctimonious from me to ask you to talk about what happened in the roof and then not answer to your – wholly justified, I might say – questions about my own experiences.”_

_Alec catches Magnus’ wrist and presses a hot, wine-moisted kiss against his palm. He probably shouldn’t be so proud, but this unexpected turn of their conversation feels more successful than a night patrol with Jace._

_“You have to excuse me,” Magnus murmurs, an unusual smile playing on his lips. “As you see, I’m still learning.”_

_It’s a phrase Alec suspects that not many have heard from the lips of Magnus Bane._

_“Although,” Magnus adds, and holds up one ringed finger, “–for my behalf, mine was decades ago, so, not such a fresh event.”_

_Alec smiles, glad for the small ice-breaker. Magnus leans down to kiss him again, deeper this time. Alec licks his lips after they disconnect again._

_“I was just wondering why,” he murmurs. “You were beautiful, you were skilled, you were wanted–”_

_“Mmm, maybe,” Magnus hums, tasting the word on his tongue, still vague enough to leave Alec confused. “But being desired is very different from being loved.”_

_Or maybe Alec does understand. To some extent, at least. Want surely lacked a certain depth._

_Maybe that’s what Magnus needed all along._

_Someone to go deeper with._

 

* * *

 

**xv.**

_“Izzy, ask Sebastian if he has any files for me.”_

_“He has, but he says that he wants to submit it to you himself.”_

_“I don’t care. Ask him to send it for me.”_

_“Alec, I’m sorry. He insists.”_

_“Fuck.”_

It feels weird to be back in the Institute. It’s only a matter of one and a half day, but so much has happened since that godforsaken Tuesday.

Sebastian is two floors below them. Two fucking floors down and where is Alec? Locked in his own goddamn office!

Magnus shakes his head. “We can’t just barge in and punch the answers out of him.”

“I don’t know, sounds like a plan for me,” Alec murmurs, striding back and forth between his desk and the door. “Excellent one, actually.”

“Alexander,” Magnus presses his palm against Alec’s sternum. It stills Alec, calms a bit his racing, raging heart. “I understand your need for direct action, trust me _, I do_ –” he makes a face Alec can’t roll his eyes at, “–but with that kind of plan, so many things could go wrong.”

Alec scoffs and pulls his hair hard enough for his scalp to ache. Sebastian fucking Verlac. He should’ve guessed, he really should.

“Like what? What? If he lies, we ask again. And again and again…” he grits his teeth, but allows Magnus to pry his hand from his hair. “We ask until we got what we want. Or until he’s dead.”

It’s soft – _oh, so soft_ – the look Magnus is giving him. Like he truly understands. Like he wishes he could agree, too.

“He might be our only chance with Azazel,” he says. Alec hates how right he is.

“Okay. Okay,” he licks his lips and continues his pacing. “So I will talk to him. Ask about the report.”

Magnus’ shoulders lose some of their tension. “Yes. We will get through him, Alexander, I promise.”

“Not us. It’s gotta be me, Magnus, and you know it.”

Alec hates to be the reason for the face Magnus is giving him.

“Don't look me like that, Magnus, _please_ ,” he groans. _How can he be so unarmored by this man?_ “It needs to be me and only me. If he didn’t suspect anything before, after Izzy’s pushing, he must now. We need to make him comfortable and that won’t happen with you or Iz breathing against his neck. It needs to be me.”

“No,” Magnus says simply.

Alec stares at him. Magnus has never denied him so directly before. And while Alec knows that Magnus, too, can be quite stubborn, he has never sounded so downright unmovable.

“You just said that this is the only way?”

Magnus shakes his head. “No. I said that we need to be smart about this, not that you walk right into the devil’s mouth, alone.”

Alec sighs and walks over to him.

Arms crossed and eyebrows furrowed, Magnus looks as relentless as ever. And worried. The fear is bleeding through his eyes, raw and unintentionally absconded. Alec curls his hands around Magnus’ biceps and leans in to press a wet kiss on the side of his mouth, cheek, the skin just under his ear. Magnus shudders, but it's barely noticeably.

“I’m not alone,” Alec tries to sound more confident than he feels. “And he’s hardly the devil. You are right behind the door, and so is Izzy. You will be able to see everything that happens through the cameras. I will be okay.”

Magnus chews at his gum, eyes fixed on Alec’s chin for a long moment. “You will promise, Alexander. And your promise holds a great value to me.”

This time Alec kisses him on the mouth.

“I promise.”

 

* * *

 

**xvi.**

“So…where’s everybody?”

Alec sits down with a sigh. Into that single action he musters all the weary, annoyed nonchalance he is able to, which isn’t really a problem at all.

The difficult part is to act like his right hand isn’t compulsorily going to his thigh and the cold steel strapped there.

“What do you mean?” he asks. “Who did you expect to see?”

Sebastian shifts his weight on his left feet. Even with wrists crossed behind his back, his militant stance seems too casual to match with the concerning look in his eyes. He flashes a quick, nonplussed smile. “No-one, I guess,” he says. “I just understood that this would be some kind of group-meeting?”

“Well, it isn’t.” Alec runs his fingers through the stack of papers that has already managed to pile up on his desk. Pretending to search something specific, he pays no further attention to the man next to him. God, he has never wished for more convincing acting skills than now.

He picks the last folder, opens it and takes out the first paper. From his peripheral vision he sees how Sebastian’s shoulders shift and his head tilts from left to right.

_Do never, Alec, never, take your eyes from the opponent. That’s how they get you._

_Yes, father._

He reads six words from the first row of the unsigned contract for the monthly shipment of victuals.

“Is there a reason you asked me here?” Sebastian asks. He doesn’t sound frustrated, not exactly, but there something peculiar in his voice. Or maybe Alec is just paying the right kind of attention now.

“Yes,” he says and pretends to read a row or few before lifting his gaze. “I was wondering if you could assist in a patrol. And second thing, in what shape is your report? Have you begun it yet?”

Sebastian uncrosses his wrists and leans against the table. In his mind, Alec curses himself with colorful swearwords for tensing up.

“Um, yes. Yes, I have. Am at the homestretch with it, actually, now as we’re speaking of it,” he says casually. “Needs a little polishing before it’s ready for submitting.”

Alec leans back on his chair. It feels wrong, very much against his training, to expose his chest and vital organs like that.

“Good,” he says tersely and rubs his forehead. He hopes it doesn’t look as sweaty as it feels against his fingers. “I’m sure that it’s fine, you can forget the finishing touches for now.”

Sebastian smiles again. It’s probably meant to reflect surprise, but all Alec can see is the smugness underneath. _That arrogant, treacherous bastard._

“Yeah, about that… Isabelle already told me you were asking for it. I apologize for the delay, although for my defense I have to say that I didn’t realize I had a deadline.”

“You didn’t,” Alec says, piling up his papers. “You don’t.” He feels like a child again, wide eyes carefully retracing daddy’s steps, pretending to do something meaningful whilst his five-year old feet can’t even touch the floor. “But the current situation – the things we are dealing with at the moment – they require action, not grammatical perfection. You can fix it later.”

He is slipping, he knows, but he can’t help it. He isn’t writing with crayons anymore.

“I wouldn’t be the first one to underestimate the power of the words,” Sebastian says slowly. “From some mouths, they can quite destructive, don’t you think?”

With growing trepidation, Alec realizes that he isn’t the only one slipping. He sincerely doubts that the mask that Sebastian wears doesn’t come off easily, which means that he is taking it off, consciously.

Alec leans forward again, elbows against the wooden desk, eyes fixated into the ophidian smile Sebastian is wearing.

“The report, please?” he says, simply.

Sebastian snorts, smile gradually slipping off. “As I said, it’s unfinished.”

Right hand sliding against his thigh, Alec feels the cold fingers of déjà-vu around his throat. Last time it was against Azazel. _This_ , he hopes, should be easier.

“And as I said, I don’t care.” He sounds unimpressed, even to his own ears. Good.

The thin, hollow remnants of a smile never wear off of Sebastian face. Hell, he barely even blinks, yet something minuscule changes in his demeanor; a micro expression that isn’t too hard to miss.

Alec isn't sure what’s happening, exactly, but he feels like he’s witnessing an exfoliation.

The first, guileless face just slips away, as easily as water would; like a snake that withers out from the ruins of its old, dead skin. Slick and nefarious pressure coils inside this debris of a man, convoluting tight around the spine and curving the bones in.

This creature speaks with the same mouth, looks through the same eyes, yet Alec has this brief, hysterical through that the soul that wears this skin so confidently isn’t really a man at all.

This new face feels far more primitive, gleaming under the lamps, cunning and malignant.

This sudden revelation is equally daunting and annoying. It’s pissing Alec off because the ball was supposed to be in his hands, for fuck’s sake. He was supposed to be the one with the upper hand, pull at the strings until that pathetical excuse of a man would stumble into his own web of lies.

But there Sebastian stands, unfolding himself in front of Alec as if it had been his plan from the beginning. _As if_ he was in control.

“What happens now,” Sebastian says with a low timbre, “depends entirely on you.” His gaze is calm – so calm that it frightens Alec a bit. It would probably scare him more if he wasn’t fuming with this barely-contained rage.

If only Alec was absolutely certain that he’d come out on top, he would strangle the man. Right here. Drag him down on the stained carpet and squeeze the life out of him.

“Don’t give me so much credit,” he says instead, through gritted teeth. “Dance like this requires two.”

The corner of Sebastian’s mouth twitches. “Maybe,” he whispers. “So the next question is: can you keep up? Somehow I doubt that you aren’t much of a dancer.”

Alec hardens his glare. Under the table his fingers are already closed around the cold hilt of his blade. He is almost certain that Sebastian knows that, but only almost, because there’s no trace of worry in Sebastian’s face.

The cards are out in the open and yet Sebastian isn’t pushing. He isn’t slashing out or denying anything like Alec expected anyone who gets exposed to do.

It’s not right, _this stillness_ , this feeling of no rush. Alec isn’t sure how to respond.

“Shame,” Sebastian says gently after a few quiet seconds, lazily cocking his head. “But don’t you worry too much about it. It’s the genes, I think. You’re fighter, not a lover, am I right?” He leans closer then, slow enough for Alec to gather and entomb his instincts to bury his knife deep into Sebastian’s pulsing carotid artery.

“…or has the warlock taught you some new moves?” he whispers, dirty, mocking.

Alec will kill this man.

If he can’t kill Azazel, he’ll kill Sebastian. He doesn’t want to know who he is, or what he is – Alec wants to hear nothing more but sound of choking from him. Choking and then silence.

Alec doesn’t consider himself a violent man – there are many wiser and more efficient ways to dissolve the situation – but now, more than anything, he wants to see Sebastian bleed. Wants to see him swallow back his own words, to choke on them.

Alec keeps his steely, unimpressed, _cracked_ mask, and repeats: “The report, please?”

He says it with mild ire, as if Sebastian hadn’t spoken at all. It probably isn’t enough to fool him; no, Alec isn’t naïve enough to even hope so. He just needs closure. The right word from Sebastian so he can bring him down.

“Yes, yes, you’ll get your report,” Sebastian says, then pushes off and away from the desk. Alec follows him with unblinking eyes as he casually loiters through the office. “What we wanna clarify is what you’re going to do. As I said, where we go from here…” he shrugs, “you call the shots.”

“You cannot leave, you must know that,” Alec tries the waters, curious how Sebastian will react.

This disappointed rise of eyebrows isn’t what he’d hoped for. It only meant the he wasn’t being taken seriously.

“You gotta start making smarter choices,” Sebastian says, low, voice going uncharacteristically coarse at the end. “You should’ve stayed blind. Then again, you were always hard to convince...”

Alec licks over his dry lower lip. He can’t take this much longer.

This circling – this unending cat and mouse game – it’s stretching his patience thin. Except neither of them is the mouse.

It’s two carnivores, prowling each others in an empty room with only bones and sinews left, waiting for the other to lower the guard, to make a mistake.

_Just fucking say it._

Sebastian sits on the armrest of the plush maroon wing chair, amused eyes contrasting his cruel smile, and Alec snaps.

“You don’t know how to bring Azazel down, do you?” he says with sharp tongue, not really a question. “Full of shit, as expected.”

For once Sebastian looks actually surprised, eyes twitching, widening just the tiniest bit. His reply is quick, and even with the gentle tone, his words bite back just as hard.

“Oh, Azazel isn’t the only one coming for you. And he definitely isn’t the worst.” A wide smile exposes the row of white teeth. “Mr. Bane should know when to back down and hide, especially from those he has so many ties with.”

Alec breathes through his nose, slowly. _Don’t think about it. He’s just fucking with your head._

Is he, though? _How the fuck could you know?_

“Or was he able to convince you to go down with him?” Sebastian laughs. It sounds dry, wrong. “Let me give you a bit of an advice: if you want a meaningful end – a memorable death, whatever – going down with a warlock isn’t gonna earn you a place on the Institute wall. You must know that.”

Alec isn’t sure if it’s his chaotic thoughts that dampen Sebastian voice – his mind is cracking, then scattering all over the place, a choir of whispers that are becoming louder and louder by second until they’re howling – or maybe it’s just the blood that’s rushing in his head.

He wants to ask what Sebastian means.

No-one is coming for Magnus, no one is coming for neither of them, per se; only Azazel, and they can – _they will_ – handle him.

“Are you threatening us?”

Sebastian’s smile widens. His next words seem to come through a thick fog, muted.

“Oh, _the bugs are coming out_ ,” he singsongs softly, “ _crawling out of their nests and right into the spider’s web_.”

Alec’s nails drag against the dark wood of the desk as he jumps over it.

 

* * *

 

**xvii.**

_Magnus rarely smiles like this. So open and unhindered._

_For someone who’s always so in control of their every movement, every expression, every word, it’s a lot._

_“And I thought I had you figured out, Alexander Lightwood,” he murmurs, voice soft with wonder._

 

* * *

 

**xviii.**

The knife is quickly wrestled from his grip, rattling across the floor, beyond the reach for both of them.

There’s blood though. Where is it coming from, Alec can’t tell.

His fingers are wrapped around Sebastian’s throat, tight, so tight that he will surely hear the snap of the neck soon enough. Sebastian is growling, nails drawing blood where they’re clawing at Alec’s wrists and forearms. His runes are faded, not nearly as freshly drawn as Alec’s, but somehow he still finds strength.

It’s unnatural.

Alec thanks the gods for the fact that he was the only one carrying weapon.

A painful punch to the gut slackens Alec’s bruising grip on Sebastian for the one, critical second. He’s horribly quick to wrestle free from the Alec’s death-hold, aiming a sharp kick at his knee.

Alec lunges at him just as the hit lands, bringing them both down. It hurts like hell, _right at the kneecap, for fucks sake_.

“– _itsy bitsy spider, coming to eat you aliv_ –”

His knuckles come up raw from the punch against Sebastian’s cheekbone, which may have cracked. Or maybe it was Alec’s own fingers.

Sebastian laughs, which sounds more like a gurgle. His teeth are slowly bleeding pink, then red, as Alec continues to land blows on his face.

Punch after punch, Alec feels the world blurring away around him.

It’s too fucked up. He doesn’t want to feel like this, doesn’t want to be so defenseless, so fucking paralyzed. His heart his twisting and constricting in his chest, trembling from the fear, and Alec doesn’t know how to protect it, _how to protect him_.

Pressure envelops Alec. It seeps through his clothes and under his skin. It’s different pressure than what the portals had. Gentler.

It’s pulling him off and away from Sebastian who is still on the floor, chest heaving and that bloody fucking smile still stretched on his face. Still breathing. _He didn’t get to the end–_

A familiar hand brushes against Alec’s throat. He relaxes slightly to the touch.

A clipped, feminine voice is calling him from somewhere behind the frenzy of his pounding blood. Alec can’t focus on it, mainly because Sebastian is still smiling. Laughing, actually; spit and blood running down from the side of his mouth.

“Is he in shock? Magnus?”

Alec couldn’t say that he hated Sebastian at the first sight, no. He had been suspicious, yes, and maybe little exasperated, but mostly because everyone else seemed to be so blinded by the blond hair and white line of teeth.

Now, though.

Now Alec could say with utter certitude that he hated the man. Spited him with every fiber of his body.

“Alec, please–”

Black ponytail bounces just under Alec’s chin, demanding for his attention.

“Alexander?”

Magnus’ voice comes through the haze, through the manic panting and chuckling of Sebastian.

Blinking fast, the world around blond bastard starts to slowly come back to him. Izzy is bodily pushing against him, arms straining as she’s trying to keep him at bay. It makes Alec realize that he’s still trying to get to the man on the floor, hands and breath trembling, blood clotting under his fingernails.

Alec sags, grinds his teeth together enough for his jaw to hurt. Izzy stays put, lean muscles tensed under her dress. Magnus is standing between them and Sebastian who’s still lying on the floor.

Sebastian looks strange down there, somehow, with his spine twisted into an unnatural angle. Magnus’ hand is trembling, his fingers curled into a fist and arm extended the slightest bit outward. He is keeping Sebastian down, Alec realizes.

“Alec,” Izzy says again. “Alec. You need to go.”

Alec scoffs. The suddenly calm atmosphere of the room is disconcerting. The rush of blood is slowly quieting in his ears.

“I’m not leaving.”

“Alec–”

“Don’t, Iz.”

“I wasn’t asking.”

“Neither am I!”

Alec regrets raising his voice at her. He feels even worse for the face she pulls; pugnacious, sad, little worried. But he can’t gather himself enough to offer a genuine, calm apology. Lungs full of fear and unanswered questions, he feels like he’s drowning.

“I don’t care,” she says, quiet but authorative. “If you can’t control yourself, you’re going. Head of the Institute or not.”

He is proud of her. He will say it later.

Alec drags in a breath through his nose. “I am calm.”

Izzy narrows her eyes.

Alec sighs. “Fine, fuck. I am calming down. Getting there, _okay_.”

She says nothing at first, contemplating his words, before finally loosening her hold around his arms.

Magnus keeps watching him with an interpretive gaze. It feels too much for now, so Alec lowers his eyes, looking anywhere but the man who’s recognition he now both cowers from and starves for.

It was bad enough, times to times, to act through these primal urges, but to surrender wholly to it? Alec wasn’t listening to the animal roaring inside his chest, he was becoming it. He was supposed to be the law, the rectitude, but how could that work out if he couldn’t even tell how far he was ready to go? The line between necessity and wrong blurred too easily nowadays.

Magnus was never the monster some people claimed him to be, but maybe Alec was.

 

* * *

 

**ixx.**

Afterwards, when the dust has lowered, Magnus pulls him aside.

“You are not a bad person for what you did, Alec,” he insists. Alec wonders how he can be so sure. “Quite opposite of it, actually. You’re just desperate. We all are. I’m sorry to tell you this, but you’re not above us.”

Alec can’t breathe, can’t look at Magnus, can’t block his words.

“You didn’t try to kill him,” he argues.

Magnus’ hand cups Alec’s shoulder, thumb caressing over his clavicle. “Maybe not. But that doesn’t mean that I didn’t want him dead.”

 _But you didn’t act on it_ , Alec thinks bitterly. There’s the difference, the only thing that matters.

Magnus sighs and leans closer. “Look, Alexander, we do things we think are right, and sometimes they aren’t. That doesn’t make us bad people. If we do right, we’ll learn, and if it goes to shit, we’ll learn from that, too. Don’t be so hard on yourself.”

Alec swallows and nods, thinking how unusual the word _shit_ sounds from Magnus’ mouth, too cheap and dirty for his beautiful lips. The knot in his chest loosens slightly and he’s finally able to look Magnus in the eye. He finds no accusation there.

“It’s humanity,” Magnus continues softly. “Not always so beautiful as we like to believe.”

 

* * *

 

**xx.**

_Magnus’ weight is grounding where he is sitting on top of Alec. Straddling him to be exact. Thighs tensed where they’re folded on each side of Alec’s hips._

_It’s not really something Alec can get accustomed to, no matter how long they have been doing this, or how often._

_Magnus’ skin feels hot, feverish almost. He is sweating, but so is Alec, so he can’t really tell whose it is that slicks up his palms. The cords of Magnus’ muscles are drawn tight as his stomach constricts from every small upsurge of Alec’s hips._

_A lone rivulet runs down on Magnus’ sternum, on the bony part of his chest between his pecks._

_“You’re not using your runes, are you?” he asks then, voice raspy; forced._

_Alec wants to rub against his perked nipples, wants to see Magnus squirm some more, but the grip he keeps on Magnus’ sweat slicked hips feels too much of an anchor for him to let go now. His thumbs are digging just above the outlined curves of Magnus’ hipbones where the skin is soft and the muscles under it hard._

_“No. Why?”_

_He is flying._

_He is drowning._

_“Good,” Magnus exhales, head tipping forward, chest heaving. “’Cause I can’t hold this.”_

_Alec smiles, wide. Some days are for testing endurance but this isn’t one of them._

_Magnus is breathing shallowly. With hooded eyes he keeps following Alec’s movements, as minimal as they are. They have been almost completely still close to minute now, ever since Magnus sank down on Alec._

_Alec blinks and swallows. Magnus’ lips are dry, due to his mouth being open for so long and the air drying his throat. His cock his flushed, twitching against his own stomach and leaving trails of pre-come there._

_He looks trusting, vulnerable even, but not quite enough. Alec wants him to give up the control altogether. He knows that Magnus wants it too, craves it even – he just doesn’t know how to let go. Or so Alec assumes._

_“Can I come inside you?” Alec asks suddenly. Inside your body, your mind, both._

_He isn’t sure why he’s even asking but the words feel right, coming out easily. Alec trusts this intuition._

_Magnus swallows audibly, throat clicking as his eyes squeeze shut. His breaths are a bit uneven, as if he’s in pain. “Jesus, Alec...” He takes a lungful of air and leans forward so their chest are almost brushing together, his single thin golden chain cold against Alec’s sternum. The motion changes the angle of Alec’s cock inside him and it’s almost too much. “You can’t say things like that just to wind me up–” he groans, low._

_Breath hitches in Alec’s throat. His hips jerk up, fingers twitching and scraping against Magnus’ skin. He doesn’t mean to but it’s beyond his control now._

_His right hand slides from Magnus’ hip to his lower back, mostly to keep him there. The left one finds its way down Magnus’ thigh and to the crook of his knee where his leg is bent against Alec’s side._

_“Can I?” he repeats as he plants his feet against the mattress, trying to regain some kind of mental equilibrium. “I want to own you.”_

_Magnus makes a noise against Alec’s throat, wet and desperate._

_When he starts to twist his hips and grind down, Alec helps him with matching thrusts and panting breaths. Magnus is unfairly and immorally good at this. Alec can’t understand how he does it. He moves almost like a snake, or a dancer, with liquid spine, riding the crests of pleasure with fluid, incessant moves._

_Alec groans at the deep circling of Magnus’ hips. He isn’t even lifting himself up from Alec’s body anymore, just grinding down on him. Dirty, maybe. More intimate than usually, in some way._

_After sucking impressive shades of blue and purple against Magnus’ throat, Alec urges him to sit upwards again. Magnus goes petulantly, bodily pushing against Alec’s palm on his chest._

_Alec flashes a smile, too breathless to keep his voice steady for any kind of complacent words. Instead he grips the underside of Magnus’ thighs, just under the swell of his ass, and thrusts up._

_Magnus tenses, snaps taut like a steel string when Alec finds the nerves hidden inside him._

_It’s a divine sight, always. Alec is strangely not aware of his body beside the pleasure. Magnus is consuming even without meaning to._

_Magnus draws his lungs full of air and keeps it in. Muscles moving beneath the skin, he looks like an ethereal creature with his ribcage expanding and hollowing out his stomach. His moves create flaring shadows that stick to every curve of a bone that’s now visible._

_Head tipping down – eyes hazy and half-lidded, unseeing – he starts to grind down again, harder this time, chasing the feeling._

_Alec lets the tide wash over him, too, and pushes his head back against the damp pillows._

_The noises they’re making are edging obscene by now as Magnus starts to lift himself up before dropping down again. Sweaty skins meet with nearly pornographically wet sound, mixed with breathless panting. Alec never expecteded to love this kind of dirty._

_Now seriously questioning his previous decision for no rune-forced endurance, Alec slows Magnus’ increasing pace by firmly gripping his waist. Magnus nearly doubles over and lets out a keening sound that is disturbingly well mirroring the nerve-frying desperation that Alec is feeling._

_“Alec, I swear–” Magnus breathes as he closes his ringed fingers around his own cock, thumb stroking over the head._

_Alec watches him with open-mouthed awe, nearly choking on his own spit and desire. Magnus keeps his eyes closed and Alec knows why. He isn’t going to push it now, though._

_With an unsteady grip under Magnus’ ass, Alec guides him up.  Up, up, up, slowly, until only the tip of Alec’s cock is stretching Magnus’ slick rim._

_Magnus’ thighs are trembling with the strain of the position he’s forced to hold. Alec’s wrists are aching, too, where he’s supporting the leftover part of Magnus’ weight._

_Then he’s sinking down again, slowly, and Alec’s eyes are rolling up into his skull. Lost under the wave, he can barely savor the hot drag of Magnus’ insides against his cock._

_Magnus is twitching, the deep muscles of his body constricting at the slow, elongated pleasure. With the slow glide down, he must be feeling every ridge and vein of Alec’s cock. He slides down gracefully, opening up to the thickest part of Alec’s cock so beautifully._

_His eyes are open now. Not looking at Alec, but that’s a secondary concern for now._

_Mouth open, throat exposed and gaze now fixed at the ceiling, Magnus keeps taking short, gasped breaths until he is seated on Alec’s cock again, the strain of it pressing against his prostate._

_Alec fears that Magnus’ pleasure is almost edging pain now as he reflexively jerks up and away before gathering his mind and pushing down again. The way he goes slack is slightly too forced._

_Maybe it was too intense?_

_“Magnus,” his words come out slurred, “Magnus – you ’kay?”_

_Magnus twists his spine in a way that’s pulling Alec even deeper under the surface. “Hh-uh?”_

_Alec swallows. He can feel the tendons of his own throat, how they’re pulled taut._

_“Does it hurt?” he rasps out, a little louder, persistent._

_Magnus opens his eyes, then narrows them in a hazy confusion. He is shaking his head, mouth forming the word ‘no’ over and over again. His cock pulsates against his stomach, the crown of it gleaming with the sticky, transparent evidence of his hunger. Alec watches how it sticks under his navel, one viscous drop sliding down to Magnus’ pubic hair. The glamour is off._

_It’s enough for Alec._

_Proud to even be able to control his limbs, Alec moves to spread the liquid with his thumb until the head of Magnus’ cock, flushed and rosy-red, is glistening with it. With a surprisingly steady grip – hand poorly lubed up with Magnus’ precome – he gives him a few languid strokes. The hot flesh in his hand feels heavy, heady._

_Magnus’ body convulses and suddenly he’s twisting towards both Alec’s hand and cock, rocking between them with quiet abandon, creating some kind of off-kilter rhythm. He is so close to the edge, almost tipping over._

_Alec feels his own control run thinner and thinner by the second, but oh how he loves this heavy and ravenous atmosphere. Loves to see Magnus fall, trusting that Alec is there to catch him. Loves to watch Magnus’ perfectly sculptured body, the beautiful shade of it, how it gleams with sweat and need under the low light. How it reacts even to the smallest movements that Alec makes._

_“I love you,” Magnus whispers through the fumes of need, “I love, I – Alexander… so, so much–”_

_Alec braces the soles of his feet better against the silken sheets. He is free-falling._

_Magnus is looking straight into his eyes, pupils blown and gold glowing on the rims of his eyes. It feels more intimate than anything Alec has experienced yet. This raw, exposing, transcendental connection by eyes._

_It’s like looking right into Magnus’ soul, feeling his every fear and insecurity as if his own. Every delicate wish and fragile anticipation. The adoration, the devotion. The nerve that reaches every corner of his mind._

_His mind is splayed open, sore and sublime._

_Alec is seeing it all, but only because Magnus is letting him. Deeper, deeper, until he isn’t sure what of these feelings are his own anymore. Magnus is under his skin, in his lungs, in his veins, mending them together._

_It’s a belonging deeper than any words could ever try to express._

_Magnus laughs suddenly, a chocked off chuckle, wet and unsteady. He blinks but doesn’t break their eye-contact._

_“I have never felt so exposed,” he gasps, so quiet that it nearly drowns under the loud roiling of Alec’s blood. “Never felt so safe.”_

_Alec feels a lump in his throat. He thrusts up again, deep, grunting as he does._

_It hits him suddenly, how alien the feeling really must be for Magnus._

_Alec is always feeling safe with Magnus. He has found a home when he didn’t even dare to dream about one. Magnus is it for him. He has never experienced what else it could be, nor doesn’t he want to, as nothing could ever possibly live up to this connection._

_But for Magnus this isn’t standard. He isn’t used to this, to this kind of devotion._

_He has experienced too many painful endings, probably middles and starts, too._

_Alec gathers all his strength and remaining control, hands slipping against Magnus’ hips and thighs as he drives into him. Magnus comes with a raw, unrestricted sound, painting his chest and jaw with pearly stripes. It leaves him panting and shaking but Alec continues his steady rhythm until Magnus is flopping forward, eyes drooping shut._

_Alec slows down and allows him to curl down. He is straining, riding on the high wave but not quite over the edge himself. He’ll get there soon enough._

_“I’m not gonna leave you,” Alec murmurs against Magnus’ cheek. “Not ever.”_

_Magnus makes an affirming sound in his throat, too sore and drained to give any further answer._

_Alec knows that Magnus doesn’t realize the depth of this promise. He will not leave Magnus on his mortal life. And not after. Magnus, if he has any say to this, will never be alone again. Never be unloved. Never a second choice. Never anyone else’s again._

_Alec isn’t the first but he’s determined to be the last._

_He pulls out with only strips of control left. Magnus goes easily, allows Alec to guide him on his back on the sheets. His limbs are moving slow, heavily._

_“I’m not as perfect as you wish me to be,” he says quietly just as Alec is positioning himself between the warlock’s thighs again. Magnus’ eyes are half-open, too exhausted to even conjure any fear in this confession._

_Alec contemplates this statement and the right way to answer it._

_“I’m not asking you to be,” he finally whispers and pushes in._

 

* * *

 

**xxi.**

It’s too easy, _a far too easy_ , to get the required information about Azazel. Sebastian practically spills the secrets out, as he would rot from inside if he held them in any longer. Yet he doesn’t look even the slightest bit of worried.

Alec grinds his teeth together. He could’ve killed Azazel before, at Magnus’ apartment. He hit the right spot, he knows that; between 8th and 9th vertebrae. His knife just hadn’t been long enough.

Sebastian keeps asking for Clary.

Alec answers to his every request with another question.

“You are in no position to make any demands here,” Alec says calmly after he hears Clary’s name mentioned for the 7th time in the past twenty minutes.

Sebastian flashes a smile, but it’s not so placid anymore. He’s starting to get frustrated.

 _Oh_ , how Alec enjoys that.

Sebastian’s fingers scratch against the steel where his wrists are trapped to. “We can be here all night, but that doesn’t change the fact you are not equipped to deal with something like this.”

“What are we dealing with? Enlighten me.”

It’s cold here – in the lower levels of the Institute where the sounds echo far too easily from the dark grey steel walls – but Sebastian’s eyes are somehow even colder.

“Let me see her,” he repeats.

Alec uncrosses his legs and leans forward, elbows on knees. “Just answer the question.”

And to think that Izzy had been alone with this man. In her lowest moment, alone and vulnerable, when she couldn’t even trust her own brother, she trusted this stranger. This fucking snake wearing a human skin.

Sebastian snorts. His teeth are still pink, the blood sticking to his gums. Alec finds an odd, twisted satisfaction in knowing that he had been the one to make him bleed.

“You're a bunch of fucking idiots, truly…”

Alec ignores that. “Are you working with Azazel?” he asks.

That earns a burst of laughter from Sebastian. “Am I working with him?” he grins, then spits on the floor, a mix of blood and spit. “You can’t blame me on any of this. I wasn’t the one who summoned Azazel and started this all. You knew the risk. You knew it and consciously chose it.”

Alec sighs and leans back again. He is getting nowhere. He hates the cell they’re in, hates the memories it digs up. The cut is too fresh. It’s too soon for him to be in this room, to sit in this specific chair. The only difference is the man trapped in front of him.

Magnus didn’t want to come down here. Alec understands completely.

“Do you have the same goal with him?” he tries once more.

“The Cup?” Sebastian narrows his eyes. “No, I’m not interested in that.”

“What do you want, then?”

“Clary.”

Alec raises up from the chair and stretches his legs. The air is stale, chilly, and he wants out.

“Goodbye, Mr. Verlac.”

“There isn't much you can do,” Sebastian says before Alec manages to step out of the room. His voice is heated, quiet. “Death is in your house. You invited it.”

Alec closes the door on his face, but the words follow.

 

* * *

 

**xxii.**

_The blackness inside his closed lids morphs quickly into deep blue at the edges. Alec doesn’t realize that he’s dreaming until he’s wandering through the thick ocean of dark azure fog again._

_He walks and walks and walks – walks until his legs tremble and the soles of his feet are aching._

_The pain isn’t real, he knows that. He’s had this dream many enough times to recognize it as one._

_That doesn’t mean that it doesn’t bother him. He’s determined to find what he has been searching for, so he continues._

_Time feels like a weirdly shaped concept in this dream-reality, so it’s hard for him to say how long he has been wandering onward. But he pushes further, step after step, stubbornly ignoring the thick and dark colors that weave around his ankles and try to slow him down._

_This is important. He can feel it._

_Move your legs._

_Left. Right. Left._

_The blue goes on and on. Every now and then Alec convinces himself that it’s endless, that this is just a way of his stress-driven brain to show him that he’s going too fast and too high. That he’s going to fall hard if he continues._

_But he doesn’t stop. He’s getting somewhere. He must be._

_Left. Right. Left._

_Again._

_Again._

_Again._

_Alec isn’t sure if it’s just his desperate imagination, or are the colors around him getting darker?_

_No. No, the deepest shades of blue are definitely bordering near black now._

_Does this mean that he’s close?_

_Does this mean that he’s too far?_

_He drives himself to go faster even though he isn’t sure that he’s moving at all. He can barely see or feel his own body in these dark, thick colors. Experimentally, Alec lifts his heavy hand up. It’s pale. Pale enough that it almost tints to translucence. He tries to touch his other hand but it goes right through._

_Ignoring that, Alec continues._

_Left. Right. Left._

_It begins to be almost too dark to see by now, but he doesn’t stop._

_Left. Right. Left._

_Left._

_Right._

_Left._

_Alec’s heart jumps to his throat when he finally catches something behind the haze of black and blue. He speeds up, anxious to reach whatever it was before it disappears. He tries to run but it doesn’t get him forwards any faster. On contrary, fast strides only seem to drag him back._

_Calming his eager steps, he thinks._

_Fast approach clearly wasn’t a right one with this. Forcing his way at it would probably only lead him back to the beginning._

_He stops altogether._

_The dark shadow stills too._

_Alec focuses on his breathing. When it’s calm again, he continues._

_Slowly this time. One step, then pause._

_Step and pause._

_The shadow begins to retreat every time Alec goes too fast, so he quickly learns the fastest possible pace to proceed. He’s getting closer now, slowly but surely. If only the fog wasn’t so thick._

_It’s a man, Alec realizes with throb of something familiar in his gut. Or looking suspiciously lot like one, at least._

_There’s something familiar in its shape, in the way it stands, calm but obviously ready to bolt at any rushed movement from Alec._

_He’s so close now, close to figuring it out. He can almost touch the prize of his patience and determination, can almost taste it–_

_“Alec.”_

_The clear voice dissolves the shadowy figure, chases away the dark._

_No–_

_“Alec.”_

Alec swats away the hand that’s prying away his blanket.

“Oh, come on Alec, you were never the ‘ _five more minutes_ ’ guy. Don’t start now.”

Alec blinks his eyes open as Izzy finally tugs the warm weight away from his grasp altogether. Yet even the chilly air against his skin isn’t sobering enough; he is swimming right under the surface, wakefulness simmering above like sun through the water.

“Wh–?” he mumbles and leans away from the hand that tries to pull him upright. He has a worryingly difficult time at catching the reality around him, the blue still lingering and pulling him down. He had been so achingly close.

“We found him.”

Alec springs up so fast that he almost stumbles off the bed. “Where?” he asks as he tries to focus his blurry eyes to find his trousers from the pile of Magnus’ clothes on the chair.

_So soon?_

“Decks,” she says simply. Alec intends to ask more but is stopped by a shirt thrown at his face. “Dress up, we’re leaving in ten. Jace is already ready.”

She is nervous, scared but intent on not showing it. It makes her easily provoked, and if not blatantly rude, then at least edging it.

He tugs his pants on silently, deciding that his pride isn’t worth picking at it now. He only hopes that the inferno in her veins burns this strong to the possible battlefield.

She leaves with fast steps and not thirty seconds later Magnus steps through the door. He looks haunted, the shadows under his eyes even more prominent than before they arrived to the Institute. It makes Alec wonder at what time he had woken up as he himself couldn’t have slept more than five hours.

“Alexander,” he says. His voice is feignedly nonchalant but there’s a heavy meaning that weights the name down. He sounds like a man who had made a decision.

Alec stills, the boot under his bed suddenly forgotten.

“Magnus,” he stands up and straightens his back. He isn’t going to force the words out of Magnus; he needs to be to one to voice it, willingly, by his own initiative. Whatever he has been evading is obviously catching up with him now, Alec realizes. Catching them.

He has a horrifying thought that Magnus is trying to evacuate the sinking ship. That he is going to push Alec over edge with nothing more than few words for lifebelt.

Well, he isn’t going to let Magnus drown with this, whatever _this_ is.

Magnus moves his feet, hands crossed over his chest. His eyes are locked on Alec’s mouth rather than his eyes. The silence doesn’t last long but they’re running out of time here and Alec can’t have Magnus crumbling now. There’s no extra seconds, no spare minutes he can offer.

“Did you meet Izzy while you…?” Alec trails off, throat dry.

“Oh, yes,” Magnus raises eyebrows in his excessive manner, and nods. “Ten minutes,” he repeats her order.

Alec licks his upper lip, feeling the cracks against his tongue.

“Did you sleep enough?” he asks his most habitual question nowadays. He asks again and again even though he knows it changes nothing. It doesn’t help Magnus.

Magnus smiles, a hollow twitch of lips that doesn’t light up anything in his eyes. He shakes his head.

“I think you already know the answer by now,” he whispers. The words are raw in their veracity.

It isn’t the answer Alec is used to receive. Maybe that’s why it twists his insides worse than the sidestepping half truths that Magnus usually offers with the matter. He doesn’t know how to answer.

Magnus is quick to change the topic.

“I’m afraid that this is too much for us,” he says, eyes now boring directly into Alec’s. He is tired, oh so tired, Alec can tell. “That as I let Azazel loose I opened doors that I cannot close.”

There’s a chilling finality in Magnus’ soft words; calm before the inevitable destruction. Placidity of a dying man.

“What doors did you open?” Alec inquires slowly, heart thumping against the prison around it, a cage made of flesh and bones and lungs. He feels the steady beats resonating through his ribcage.

Magnus bites into his flesh inside his cheek. Alec isn’t close enough to decide if there really is wetness in his eyes or if it’s just a trick of light. He is rooted to the cold floor, rooted to his fear.

“Magnus?”

Magnus blinks and looks down again, the line of his jaw becoming more prominent as he grinds his teeth together. Then he sighs, shoulders dropping as he visibly deflates.

“You know, Alec, I wouldn’t hold it against you,” he continues in a tone that indicates that Alec should know what he’s referring to.

Alec really, really doesn’t. He isn’t sure he ever held the red thread of this dreadful conversation in his hands.

“What?” his voice pitches unusually high. “Magnus, what–?”

“I wouldn’t hold it against you if you wanted to choose something…simpler,” Magnus explains quietly. He is avoiding Alec’s eyes again. As if he was trying to make it easier that way. “Simple is good. Sometimes even boring is good.”

Alec realizes that Magnus is referring to Alec’s own words, to their conversation back at Girona. It’s so ridiculous that Alec almost doesn’t believe it. Yes, he had hoped for a breather in that moment, perhaps even a simpler life – _hell, he still does_ – but his words were never tied to Magnus. Not like that.

“I didn’t mean you back then,” Alec breathes out and steps closer.

He tries to reach for Magnus’ bicep to pull him closer but Magnus sidesteps him almost casually. Yet that small movement makes the calmness falter and bleed away and Magnus looks suddenly simultaneously younger and older at the same time. Maybe the youth is the pain that shines in his eyes, and the way he has to open his mouth to breathe.

Still Alec doubts that this evasion hurts him more.

It was them against the world, against the odds, against the suspicion. For Alec, it was Magnus before anything else. Magnus was the one he could draw strength from to continue.

He could take much, but he couldn’t take _this_. He couldn’t take Magnus pulling away from him.

There’s a lump in Alec’s throat. He doesn’t feel at balance anymore, the rug suddenly pulled from under his feet. Funny, how little it takes in the end. Or how much.

Alec hopes that Magnus knows what power he holds over him.

“You, you can’t hold that against me, Magnus–,” he croaks out. His thoughts are in a loop for the same few sentences, blind with the fear that closes its fist around his heart and yanks. “You can’t–”

Something in Magnus’ eyes breaks even further and this time he doesn’t step away when Alec comes and catches his elbow.

“Oh Alexander, I’m not holding anything against you,” Magnus says. There’s something damp coloring his voice.

“Then what are you doing?” Alec asks, suddenly desperate as he pushes his own body against Magnus’, trying to crowd him against the door so he couldn’t try to walk away again. His hands travel along Magnus’ body – arms, sides, hips – searching for something to hold on, something to prevent him from saying these words.

Magnus’ hand sneaks around Alec’s neck to pull him in and press their foreheads together. His breath smells like too-creamy coffee. Alec’s own breaths are coming a little too loud, a little too fast.

“I’m giving you a way out,” Magnus whispers, words sounding forced but honest.

Alec makes a wounded noise in his throat, eyes squeezing shut. The grip around his heart tightens.

“No. _No_. I never asked for a way out, I never wanted one,” he alleges lowly, heatedly. “You can give it to me as many times as you want, I’m not taking it.”

Magnus laughs, quick and sharp and painful. This time it reaches his eyes though, if only briefly.

“Always so stubborn,” he exhales and presses his lips against Alec’s, a bittersweet kiss that Alec takes like a starving man, as if he hasn’t seen Magnus in years instead of hours. “How much do you really even know about me?” Magnus asks when they part. The back of his head knocks against the door as he pulls further against it, eyes searching for Alec’s.

Alec chooses the eye-contact over the urge to surge in for another slick kiss. If only they had more time. Izzy’s ten minutes must be almost up already.

“I know enough. Maybe I don’t know all that has happened to you, but I know _you_.”

“But isn’t that a crucial information?” Magnus presses, “Where I came from and what happened to me. How I became me.”

“I know you,” Alec repeats adamantly. He knows that Magnus is trying to make him doubt his decisions, _doubt them_. If Magnus only knew that Alec hadn’t doubted his love for Magnus for a long time.

Magnus lowers his eyes again. His fingers curl against Alec’s black t-shirt, nails pressing through the thin fabric and marking Alec’s skin with shallow crescents.

“Doesn’t it bother you that so many have known me before?” he continues to incite, palms pressing against Alec’s abdomen in an attempt to push him away.

It’s a more like a nudge, no real force behind it, so Alec’s doesn’t move.

He knows from the way Magnus had been starving connection, not attention, that he really hasn’t had many that had truly known him. Or at least hasn’t been in a long time.

“You aren’t really that indiscernible with your attempt to push me away,” he says, hoping Magnus to give up with it.

The sad smile that graces Magnus’ face is making Alec’s chest ache even further. “I’m only saying the truth.”

“And what is the truth?”

Magnus presses himself even further against the door, as if preparing for the effects of his words.

“That there are things…” he wets his lips, “–things that I haven’t told you. Things that you don’t probably want to know, even if you should. I’m not as whole as I like to pretend.”

The words bite, silvery teeth sinking deep into Alec’s flesh, but like he said already, he doesn’t care. Not anymore. He doesn’t care how many people had figured Magnus out, how many knew how to make his heart race like he has ran a mile with a demon on his heels – Alec wants to learn himself.

He pushes against Magnus’ hands separating them, getting close enough to nudge his nose against Magnus’ cheek.

“I. Don’t. Care.”

Magnus draws in a sharp, wet breath, and Alec realizes that Magnus has been holding his breath since he stopped talking. He turns his head to the side, away from Alec’s breath ghosting the side of his mouth. His eyes are closed.

“You really should,” he murmurs, jaw tight.

“Then you’ll tell me. Whenever you’re ready,” Alec says. “I’ll wait.”

When Magnus opens his eyes again the glamour is gone, revealing all the shades and shadows of deep gold and elliptical pupils.

“What if it’s after ten years? Twenty? _Fifty?_ ”

“Then it’ll be so.”

The ironic thing in the whole situation was that Magnus was the one with the demon blood. He was the one who was considered less pure, less pristine, _less human_. It was truly twisted indeed, because under the impassive and steely layers, Magnus was no doubt most humane and compassionate person who Alec knew by heart.

“Do you really trust me that much?” Magnus asks, eyes sharp and vulnerable all the same.

“I trust you even more.”

Magnus makes a noise in his throat, eyes flickering up to the ceiling as if he was praying. Alec hopes, _if he truly was praying_ , that it would be for some kind of affirmation to believe Alec’s words, not strength to continue this fucked up quest to push him away.

“Look,” Alec clenches his jaw, “I think I can handle some skeletons in the closet. It’s not as new to me as you think. I mean, I lived there over twenty years.”

Magnus snorts; a little, wet sound. The smile that ghosts on Magnus’ lips makes Alec incredibly proud, even in a moment like this. _Especially_ in a moment like this.

“Good one, babe, really,” Magnus murmurs.

Alec waits for him to continues, heart in his throat.

“I never meant to keep this all from you.” Magnus sounds almost apologetic, intent to make Alec understand.

“I know,” Alec says quietly, afraid that he will break the moment. His heart stays constantly crude, _fast fast fast_ goes its beat.

Magnus’ hand trails up to the wrinkled collar of Alec’s shirt, fingers dipping under it to smooth over his shoulder and to trace his collarbone. Alec presses to the touch, craving more of it.

“Sometimes I’m afraid of myself,” Magnus whispers, “of what I can do.”

Alec stays quiet, almost not daring to breathe.

“I have met my father twice,” Magnus continues. “The second time I did he said that this isn’t a place to build a home for me. That I don’t belong here but rather on his side.”

Why is Magnus telling him this now, Alec doesn’t understand. Unless, of course, Magnus intends to listen to his father’s advice. The thought feels unbearable.

“Do you want to?” Alec asks abruptly, needing that confirmation, “Do you want to go with him, I mean?”

Magnus blinks, fingers stilling on Alec’s collar. He looks up, eyes widening like no-one had ever asked that question from him before. Alec feels cold all of sudden.

_Maybe this was never about a free choice at all._

“Magnus. Who’s your father?”

A sharp knock to the door behind Magnus’ back startles him.

It’s Izzy’s voice, muffled by the wooden barrier between them, yet horribly vociferous in Alec’s ears. “Alec, _now!_ ”

“Soon!” he yells through the door. He’s still hoping to get an answer to his question but Magnus is twisting away from his hold and opening the door, letting her voice in much clearer and louder. She sticks her head through the crack immediately.

“Not soon, _now_ ,” she says in a way that leaves no room for arguments, then proceeds to walk away with loud click of heels.

Magnus looks sobered, eyes now dry and the shadows under them hidden.

“We’ll talk about it later,” he says, hand lingering on Alec’s forearm. “After this is all over.”

Then he’s gone, too, and Alec is left alone with only one boot on and heart still hammering with a pace of hummingbird.

He wishes that Magnus hasn’t told him all these things now.

 

* * *

 

**xxiii.**

_He forgets to breathe. He simply forgets to._

_There’s an animalistic ardor in them, Alec admits. A carnal stirring of something ancient in their golden glow. Like the way Greek worshipped their gods in human forms, how they dressed them in gold and jewelry, bathed them in wine and prayers, forgetting that real gods require blood._

_Magnus turns away far too quickly, head pressed down and eyes shut._

_Alec just gapes, speechless for he has never seen Magnus – even without all his clothes as an armor – so bare._

_“Is it difficult to keep? Exhausting, I mean,” Alec finally speaks, searching for words, “Is it exhausting to keep the glamour up all the time?”_

_The dark brown is back again when Magnus lifts his gaze. Alec is disappointed. He ponders if it would be too bold or impolite to ask for Magnus to drop it again._

_Meanwhile Magnus clears his throat, looking anywhere but Alec._

_“It slips sometimes. When I’m too tired or overwhelmed.”_

_Alec’s muscles are straining. He presses his fingers to his thighs to keep himself from standing up and walking around the room to vent out this sudden heat. There’s a fiery and bestial feeling in his gut that he is all too eager to explore._

_“Does it ever slip during, you know…during sex?” he asks, blood flooding to his cheeks and neck. He isn’t bashful enough to not to ask._

_How many have seen them?_

_How many of them had appreciated what they had been offered, willingly or otherwise._

_Magnus doesn’t move but something seems to deflate in his character. He has this tired, accepted look in his eyes – the exactly opposite reaction Alec was striving for._

_“Don't worry, I’ll focus extra hard to keep it on.”_

_“No,” Alec laughs. It bubbles from his chest as he reaches for Magnus’ face. “No. I meant...could you drop it? Could you show them for me?”_

_Magnus’ lips part, the suspicion in his eyes slowly but surely turning into wonder._

_Alec wants to keep surprising him forever._

 

* * *

 

**xxiv.**

He packs up his gear with a record speed but Izzy still gives him her best unimpressed look. She’s already armed up to the teeth and the lipstick she uses is the darkest shade of red she owns.

Their plan doesn’t suddenly feel all that smart anymore. Now that Alec really stops to think about it, it’s not actually a plan at all. With arrows, he was the only one with actually piercing weapon. Blades could go deep enough with enough driving force, sure, especially if striking from back, but how would they manage to get in to the combat distance for that?

“Does everyone know their position?” he asks anyway, understanding that they were gravelly running short of these kinds of chances.

Scattered agreeing comes from around him.

Tactically speaking, splitting up would be the most efficient plan, but Alec’s firmly against that. They were going to approach the stock building in two groups.

Clary curls around Izzy’s arm immediately, bidding her, which meant that she and Jace were on an uneven ground again. Jace glances at Alec and Magnus, briefly, before tightening the strap around his thigh.

“I’ll go alone,” he says after a few seconds of awkward silence.

Alec rolls his eyes. He truly didn’t have time for dramatics.

“You’re coming with me and Magnus,” he tells him. He is glad that Jace isn’t making any further comments or objections about that.

Better three than one.

“Clary and Izzy, you go in from the east; Jace, Magnus, and I from northern entrance. North side has the stairs inside so I can go up and locate Azazel from there.”

Alec looks around the table, finding everyone nodding collectively.

“Good,” he says slowly. “Keep the distance. And if possible, cover me so I can take the shot. But if any of you is discovered before I get to the position – and I cannot stress this enough – fall back.”

Clary narrows her eyes. “Fall back…?”

“Yes, fall back. He’s too much for any of us to take alone.”

She looks displeased at the order, pursing her lips. “We cannot let him slip away again. You know how hard it’s been to locate him – Izzy’s been monitoring the city day and night for this.”

“I understand that,” Alec rubs the bridge of his nose. “What I don’t understand, though, are the unnecessary risks.”

“Alec, you have – not only one, _but two_ – unordinary Shadowhunters with you. And Magnus. We aren’t invincible, I know, but it would be stupid not use this. _Use us_. Jace and me.”

“If Magnus can’t take him alone, what makes you think you can?” Alec snaps.

She opens her mouth, but nothing comes out. Her eyes burn and Alec answers to it with his own cold gaze. She and Jace weren’t any disposable weapons for him to use. None of them were.

“We need to go,” Izzy cuts off their staring contests. She turns to Magnus. “Magnus. If you would?”

She and Clary go though the portal first with Jace fast behind them. Mentally preparing himself for the uncomfortable sensation, Alec closes his hand around Magnus’ before stepping into the swirling abyss.

 

* * *

 

**xxv.**

It should’ve been the last deck, last warehouse.

They were supposed to have at least some kind of coverage, but the beach that starts from the decks is completely desolated.

Alec can feel his blood pressure rising. Beach was too open for their purpose, no changes to distract or hide.

“Are you absolutely certain that it comes from there?” he asks.

Magnus had pulled them aside before they managed to enter the rusted building. Said that he couldn’t sense Azazel inside it, that the feeling of his presence was coming from elsewhere.

“He has legs, along with other methods of transportation,” Magnus says, eyeing the empty beach in the chilly autumn wind. “He is no more glued to one pace than you are at the moment.”

Alec sighs. The pressure under his breastbone keeps forcing the words out. “So what, he just took a casual walk on the beach? Do demons even do that? Where did you read that from, his dating profile?”

Magnus rolls his eyes excessively. There’s a carefully guarded anxiety in them and it scares Alec more than he wants to admit. Magnus wasn’t easily intimidated.

“You can be quite snarky when you’re stressed, you know that?”

Alec looks at the beach again, waiting to see a dark figure looming at the waterline. Wearing awfully colored swimsuit, hopefully. The mental image doesn’t make their rival appear any less dangerous.

“Well, I have a good reason to be stressed,” he mumbles.

“If he’s moving then shouldn’t we be moving, too?” Jace asks and nods at the wooden stairs that descend down to the beach. “We can’t let him out of the hook again.”

“You’re saying that as if we were the fishermen here,” Alec grumbles but goes for the stairs anyway. He texted Izzy to let them know about the change of plans, so she and Clary shouldn’t be too far behind.

Magnus hesitates for a second before following.

The air vibrates as soon as Alec’s boots sink into the sand. Something unpleasant but familiar spreads on his skin. He feels Magnus’ hand suddenly around his wrist and halts.

_This was a mistake, a huge fucking mistake–_

Jace was still going.

Magnus rushes past Alec, right into–

“Jace–!”

The reality ruptures, breaks, and explodes.

Alec flies back from the pressure of it. Back and down.

Down. _He is falling, into the blue again._

_He swims through it until he finds some kind of bottom to place his feet on. It’s not exactly solid, but it’s close enough._

_The dark color around him is almost comforting, thick and quiet. He wanders through it, not even searching, not before he sees a shadow in the swirling indigo space._

_Heart pounding, Alec walks faster._

_He’s almost there. The shadow seemed so close but it still takes an awfully long time for him to get anywhere near it._

_But he does. He does, only to see the familiar outlines of sharp shoulders and spiked hair. His heartbeat slows down. He feels calm, all of sudden. It’s so different compared to the usual desperate tone he has in this strange ocean._

_He takes a few more steps, and finally. Magnus is standing before him._

_He looks beautiful, but there’s something different about him, in a way a dream twists your sense of reality._

_“Alexander,” Magnus smiles. “Did you come for me?”_

_“Yes,” Alec tries to say, but only bubbles come out. “Yes I did.”_

_Magnus tilts his head. The lines of his face are stark, as usual, but also somehow blurred. Soft._

_“Thank you,” he says, but doesn’t move. “I got a little too deep, I think. It’s very dark here.”_

_His tone is so quiet, so careful, that it makes Alec’s heart ache even in this figmental phenomenon. He wants to close his arms around Magnus, feel that he isn’t just shadows built by his imagination._

_“Are you afraid of it?” he asks instead because he himself finds it occasionally quite intimidating. Comforting, but colossal in its space. Unexplored._

_Magnus shakes his head. “No, I’m not afraid of it. Just…it’s easy to get lost in it. Sometimes it’s hard for me to find the way back…” he trails off before looking up at Alec._

_His eyes are gentle gold, but he has no pupils. It isn’t scaring Alec. Maybe it should, but it isn’t._

_“I don’t want to be alone,” he continues, and Alec’s chest tears. It fucking bursts open. Alec looks down, and yes, there’s a wound in his chest, pouring blood._

_“You're not alone,” he says, ignoring the red that slicks his shirt._

_Magnus tilts his head, slowly. His eyes are so sad, so full of anguish, and Alec doesn’t know how to handle the pain of it._

_“Then why are you leaving?” Magnus asks, quiet._

_“What? No. I’m not leaving–?”_

_“I don’t want to ask, but I’m selfish enough to want you to choose me.”_

_Alec tries to get to him, but can’t get forwards. “You don’t have to ask,” he grits through his teeth. There is blood on his tongue and the edges of Magnus are starting to fade away.  
_

_There’s a flash of something sharp and raw in Magnus’ eyes, just before he goes. It’s dangerously tempting, the way he lights up and flashes with anger, so bright and bold. And not because of Alec, but for him._

_For him, yes, because for this brief second Magnus looks like he would die for him. Not for a personal cause, not for a greater good. For him. Without thinking. Alec can feel the intensity of the through run through his own veins because it’s essentially what he’s feeling, too._

_He presses against the slow current of red that streams from his chest. He wants to see Magnus’ knuckles raw, wants to kiss the blood from them._

_The gold of his eyes is what goes last._

Alec opens his own eyes.

His ears aren’t ringing. He simply can’t hear anything.

There’s a sound, oh, he can _see_ it. The air is humming, oscillating with tension.

His ears are aching. There’s something thick against his pharynx, blocking some of the air. The wind smells like sulfur, like fire, like magic.

Magnus is knee deep in the dark water. He is slipping, stumbling, trying hold his ground. His ward is cracking, flashing like electricity that’s gonna go down at any second.

He’s holding Azazel back, but just barely.

Alec blinks, listening the quiet hum of the annihilation around him. He rises up, then, but the ground tilts, shifts under him. He catches himself just barely before his face hit the sand. The sounds are coming back, but his balance isn’t.

He sits up on his knees again, eyes down, waiting the vertigo to pass.

There’s a weird sense of artificiality. Alec can see his hands closing around the fine sand, can see it cascading from his shaking grip, but he can’t _feel_ it. The world has an illusory, dreamlike edge.

_This couldn’t be happening. It couldn’t go this much wrong._

Something stumbles against him. A grip on his elbow, on his shoulder. It’s Jace’s face, moving jerkily in his peripheral vision. There’s urgency in his movements, in his voice that Alec can barely hear.

 _This couldn’t be happening_. Alec keeps echoing that, yet he feels none of the panic that the sentence holds in. No adrenaline, no crippling fear. There’s anguish, though. So deep and vast that Alec can’t keep it at bay. He can’t hold back the ocean. The water keeps slipping through his fingers.

He tries to clutch into this tiny, shivery reality, but it feels too painful and he doesn’t want to try. He wants wake up from this. Wake up to see Magnus with his cheek pressed against the pillow and back exposed to the morning light.

Alec closes his eyes.

It’s too unsubstantial to be real. He was okay. Magnus would be okay.

None of this was happening.

Why would he walk into a situation like this, anyway? He wasn’t stupid, he wasn’t naïve. They couldn’t find Azazel before, why would he allow them to find him now. This was merely an unfinished business. He wanted them here. He wanted _Magnus_ here.

Alec blinks.

Jace has stopped trying to get through him. He gives Alec a final, rough shake, then stands up, his seraph blade flashing in the darkening light of the day.

His steps are sure as he strides towards Azazel’s turned back.

Alec watches him go. Watches him getting flung back like a ragdoll. Watches him hit the sand. Watches him stumble up again, eyes searching frantically for his fallen weapon.

Something alters.

Alec looks back at Azazel. He is on the water now, too, where he has followed Magnus, trying to catch him like a retreating wave. It’s shallow there; the water reaches only Azazel’s kneecaps. Magnus is on his knees so the tides swirl around his waist as he tries to pull away.

Azazel has his hand around Magnus’ throat, and Magnus fights, but it’s futile, a golden crackling where’s he’s clawing at the hand around his windpipe. It’s a horrible thing to witness.

There’s a vindictive spark in somewhere behind Alec’s breastbone. A violent, bloodthirsty creature that stirs and stretches, inhales the coppery air, bares its teeth. It’s a feeling out of place because it’s an animal born from loss.

He shouldn’t be mourning for something that isn’t lost, not yet.

 _This isn’t real, this isn’t real, this isn’t real,_ except that it is.

 _You promised_. He might have not promised to Magnus, but he promised to himself. Alec exhales, stretches his neck. He is stronger than this. He needs to be. This isn’t going to be how it ends.

He stands up, slowly. Through this simple task, he focuses on his breathing only. The ground under his feet feels unsteady. Alec gives himself a second, then tests his balance by taking a step.

His head feels empty and full at the same time, as if his brains has turned into something liquid instead of a concrete matter. The blue ocean of his dream is pulling at him, tugging, seducing him with a reality where Magnus is safe, unharmed in the embrace of the waves.

It’s in great contrary with the wild, unrestricted furor in his chest.

Alec follows the beast.

His bow is half buried in the sand and Alec has to go down on his knee to pick it up. He is careful, but the world slips a little anyway. The quiver is still on his back. Alec is sure that he’s gonna wear a bruising that matches it.

He picks an arrow, but doesn’t walk closer. With his condition, his changes are close to zero anyway.

Magnus has gone slack in Azazel’s grip. His eyes are still open, but his magic is broken, forced down. He is watching up at Azazel with hooded, pained eyes. He’s hurting, hurting, _hurting_ , his panic fading into a heartbreaking acceptance.

He is giving up.

Alec raises his bow. The roaring inside his chest has grown louder, an inferno that burns like a black fire in his bones. His hands are shaking, crucially so.

He closes his right eye, focuses with his left.

It doesn’t help. The steel tip sways too much, he’s too far away, _he’s too late–_

Alec counts the vertebrae’s in his mind anyway. He counts them and lets go.

He can’t hear the sound of his arrow hitting its target, but he hears the silence that follows, somehow.

The moment stills, shrinks. Implodes, almost. Alec isn’t sure if Azazel is shaking or if it’s just his own lightheadedness. Magnus’ eyes are wide as he takes huge gulps of air. Alec can’t hear that either, but he is almost sure that the grip around Magnus’ throat is looser now.

The beast in Alec’s chest is deadly quiet, too. It’s absolute still, holding its breath. Listening this sudden silence with a cold anticipation.

Azazel’s suit jacket starts to disperse, dissolving off from his very back. Alec keeps watching as the demon breaks apart, quietly, as if surprised. That is, until he tightens his blackening hand around Magnus throat, leans in, seething something that Alec can’t hear.

More ash, a red flash, and he’s gone.

Magnus falls down at the water with nothing to hold him up anymore.

There’s something icy trembling in Alec’s chest. Fear comes tardily, lagging behind like a loyal god with broken leg. But it comes, sharper than ever. It shakes Alec to the core, wakes him up better than a bucket of freezing water splashed at his face.

It was luck. _Pure, foolish, ridiculously well-timed luck._

Alec drops his bow. He is getting closer to Magnus, which is weird, because he can’t remember moving his legs. But he must be, because he’s getting closer and Magnus is staying still, waist-deep in dark water, chest heaving, looking at this suddenly empty space before him.

Alec is saying Magnus’ name, over and over again. He can hear himself, faint as a whisper inside his own skull.

The ocean is awry, the swirling movement of waves causing nausea to push through. Alec swallows back the gag and coughs, but he doesn’t stop. Magnus steps out of the water before Alec gets to him. He walks shakily, and drops on the wet sand immediately as he gets out of the waves.

Alec reaches for him as he falls on his knees, too, knees bumping against Magnus’. His unsteady fingers brush against Magnus’ forehead, cheeks, jaw. They slide to his throat, to his neck, before Alec cups the back of Magnus’ head in his palm to pulls him close.

Magnus comes easily, slumping against Alec’s chest, malleable in his hands. His breath is hot and fitful against Alec’s neck.

A faint voice reaches his ears. Jace is shouting. Alec kinda wishes that he would shut up, ’cause he can’t understand, _he can’t fucking comprehend_ what has happened to lead them in this fucking situation. He can’t even internalize if they came out on top? The dread that shakes his bones doesn’t allow any room for reprieving.

But Magnus is in his arms. He is there, alive. Bruised but alive, _and pulling away…?_

Magnus is saying his name; Alec knows even though he can’t hear it. His palms are flat against Alec’s chest as he’s trying to push himself away. Alec doesn’t want to let go of him. He does, though, but only to see Magnus’ face better.

He grips at Magnus’ elbow and bicep to keep him from moving further. Magnus doesn’t look relieved like he expected. His eyes are flicking over Alec’s head and back to him again. He is speaking, fast words that match with the urgent despair that glows in his eyes.

No. _No_ , Alec doesn’t want to see this kind of look on him. Never again. He doesn’t want to know what this kind of fear from Magnus might foreshadow.

Too much of it is slipping past him. Alec can’t hear enough through this fog, so he focuses on Magnus’ lips and tries to read the rest of it from there.

“– _lexander, need to go_ –”

Alec swallows, trying to keep up. Just long enough to fill the gaps.

“– _zazel said before. We need to go_ –”

Magnus is rising up, tugging Alec with him. There’s a growing worry in his eyes. Probably for Alec’s dumbfounded expression.

“– _s is coming_ –”

The ground shatters under them.

It doesn’t but it certainly feels like it. It’s a low timbre, strong enough to echo and vibrate through the ground.

Alec blinks, watches how Magnus’ eyes widen, how the wave retreats from the coast behind him. He frowns. That’s not how the way water behaves. The waves should push against the shore, not start from there.

The clarity comes from the second wave of pressure. It resonates in his bones and strains his spine. The sharp pain in his skull makes him flinch and gasp as his ears pop open. The cotton is gone from his head.

Magnus is staring over Alec’s shoulder, eyes glassy and chest heaving along with his irregular breaths.

Alec can hear it now. He can also hear the wind and the water hitting the sand. His own breathing is too loud and harsh. Still the only one that he can focus on is Magnus. He doesn’t look over his shoulder. He doesn’t want to. He wants to jump back in the blue, in the cotton where he can’t feel or hear anything.

He does look.

There’s a gap on the ground. A wound with red, inflamed edges and black smoke. Something is crawling up from it but Alec can’t see what, can’t see enough through the thick fumes. He gags at the smell, so strong that even his eyes water.

A flash of something white. The figure stands up, _stands out_ , and Alec wonders briefly why the fuck these things couldn’t stay in the shadows?

The man is tall. It’s an unusual notice from Alec.

He is wearing a well-sitting white suit that effortlessly compliments his relaxed posture and half-lidded eyes. He looks horrifyingly familiar in a way Alec can’t neither understand nor ignore.

The demon steps closer and now at the latest Alec is able to affirm the striking gold of his eyes as well as the oval shaped pupils.

Something cold seeps in Alec’s gut as he begins to realize. Magnus is trembling next to him.

The demon fixes the silvery cufflinks of his suit, as if he had all the time in the world, then looks up at them.

“Hello Magnus.”

**Author's Note:**

> i. Thank you so much Hikaru9Yume for your thoughts and invaluable opinions!
> 
> ii. This work is unbetaed. English still isn't my first language, so I want to apologize for all the mistakes you'll find, they're all my own. If you could point them out for me, I'd be thankful!
> 
> iii. I'm not ready to give up on them.


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